Santa Scores

About ten years ago, beautiful wife Sandy came up with a surprise holiday gift—a large Green Bay Packers flag.  Flagpoles weren’t allowed in yards in the planned community where we lived in Utah.  I often flew Old Glory from a standard attached to the building adjacent to our garage door, which was in keeping with community rules.

What so proudly I once hailed.

The second flag posed a bit of a problem during football season.  So we devised a sharing system that became an amusement for most (but not all) of our neighbors.  A Bears fan down the street definitely was not amused.  Neither was a Cowboys fan across the street, but he launched a counter attack by displaying his own team colors.  The Bears fan merely seethed.

The sharing plan was simple.  If the Packers won their weekly game, their flag was displayed soon after the contest ended.  It flew until Wednesday, when it was displaced by the Stars and Stripes.  The national flag stayed up until the Pack won again.

When we moved three years ago, our new place had a regulation flagpole installed by the previous owners in the lawn beside the house.  There also was a standard beside the garage door, almost exactly like the one in Utah.  No rotation problem here.  But as one who fancies tradition, the Geezer continued to display the Packers banner in the old way—up after a win, down on Wednesday until the next win. 

For almost two years, the rotation worked well.  Toward the end of last year, however, it got a little old.  The Packers ended the season with six consecutive victories.  It became drudgery to take the banner down and reinstall it every week.

Prospects were even better for the team this season, so the Geezer devised a labor-saving strategy—leave the flag up until the Packers lost.  The new plan seemed a stroke of genius as the Packers won 11 straight games.

This week, Sandy devised a new strategy for our annual holiday lighting display.  Lights were strung most of the way around the garage.  The design placed lights perilously close to the Packers flag.  With any sort of breeze, the flapping banner threatened to destroy a key part of Sandy’s display.  Something had to give.  Guess what won out.

Ho, Ho, Ho . . . . Packers, you’re on your own now, you know.

In Grateful Memory

                                                          

Pvt. Jackie L. Diener II (U.S. Army), 20, Boyne City, Michigan.  Killed by small arms fire in Kandahar Province, Afghanistan, November 21, 2011.

A Great Day, Indeed

Today is America’s best celebration.  Thanksgiving truly is for everyone.  It is not part of any specific religious tradition; it is for all to enjoy.  For this one day, we can cast aside worries about the future and focus only on the good things that have happened in our past.

I am thankful that I was born in a prosperous nation and have lived a long and generally pleasant life with the freedom to chart my own course. Through good and bad times, many people have supported and guided me. I appreciate all of them, especially Sandy, my beautiful wife.

I am thankful that my family does not want for food, shelter, or love.  Today we will be together. That is the best thing of all.

How Not to Run a Restaurant

We drove seven miles to one of our favorite little restaurants, anticipating a tasty delight and a bargain.

The special of the day, advertised in the local shopping guide, was a tuna salad sandwich.  We made our journey because of it.  Previous experiences were that the sandwich, when designated the special, was very good and came with choices—soup, salad, or fries and sometimes combinations of two of the three, plus a bottomless drink.

The restaurant owner seated us, took our drink order, and announced as she walked away, “Oh, the special today is a taco salad.”  We knew a taco salad concocted in that restaurant’s kitchen was anything but special.

“Isn’t today’s special tuna salad?” I asked.  “No, they made a mistake.  I don’t know how they got tuna salad into that ad,” said the restaurateur.  I said that was very disappointing, because we had a hankering for tuna salad.  I spoke slowly, giving the lady every opportunity to authorize the advertised special for us.  She did not.

A bit later, our waitress appeared.  I inquired about the tuna salad special.  She laughed, and said, “Isn’t that the darndest thing?”  Again, I described our affection for the sandwich, and added the fact that we had driven miles out of our way for it.  The waitress seemed a little surprised when we asked for more time to study the menu.

We actually discussed walking out.  Instead, we wasted some time perusing the menu believing there was a pretty good chance the waitress would reappear and offer us tuna salad sandwiches as advertised.  She reappeared without any special deal.  I ordered a tuna salad sandwich anyway, and said, “That’s what the special would be if it really was the special, wouldn’t it?”

“Yes,” said the waitress.  That was almost correct; it cost 30 percent more than the price for specials, and included only one optional side dish. The drink was extra.

On the way home, beautiful wife Sandy and I decided it will take one helluva special offer to lure us back to that restaurant.  I might even be forced to learn how to make tuna salad.

Taking Stock

My favorite pro sports team, the Green Bay Packers, once again is gearing up to sell stock to the public.  Nothing new about that. The club has held numerous sales of shares since the 1920s when it was organized as a nonprofit corporation with backing from several local business leaders.

In the early years, sales of shares kept the team alive, often just barely.  Recent sales financed major improvements at Lambeau Field, allowing the Pack to pick up considerable extra revenue from home-game crowds and special events. That money has helped the franchise compete with those owned by billionaires in big cities.

Hanging on a wall of my office is one framed share of stock issued in 1997 by Green Bay Packers, Inc.  I bought it for $200.  It has proved to be a horrible or great investment, depending on how you view such things.  The dollar value is zero.  The value of the bragging rights is immense.

Not for profit; for bragging rights

Much has been written and said about Packers history since the big team representing the little city burst upon the national stage back in the 1960s. Championship years arrived just as color television came into millions of American homes and professional football emerged from the shadows of sports to become somewhat of a national mania.

I’m not an expert on Packers' lore, but I’ve read much of what has been written about club history, attended the first game in Lambeau Field in 1957 (we beat "da Bears" 21-17), and have followed the team’s fortunes more or less closely for nearly 65 years. Here are some of my favorite trivia, some factual, some based on rumor and questionable recollections. A few items correct erroneous statements by current news people, mostly television announcers:

• Television talking heads frequently state the Packers are the “only professional sports franchise owned by the community.”  Wikipedia makes the same statement. The statement is incorrect.  I am one of 112,158 shareholders, living all over the world, who own the team.  Obviously, all the owners do not live in Green Bay.  This relatively unimportant error may be caused by confusion between team and home field ownership. The City of Green Bay, not the Packers, owns Lambeau Field, which has become somewhat famous in its own right.

• Accounts of the dire financial straits faced often by the team in early days are not exaggerations.  Perhaps the most desperate situation occurred when a section of the wooden grandstand in old City Stadium collapsed during a game. (at its largest, old City Stadium seated 25,000 when all stands were upright). The collapse caused many injuries.  The Packers’ insurance company couldn’t handle the volume, went bankrupt, and thus defaulted on many claim payments.  A stock issue raised enough money to pay the claims and save the franchise.

• It often has been said that if the corporation was to be liquidated, an unlikely event, all proceeds would go to an American Legion Post in Green Bay, because the post bought a block of preferred stock many years ago that gave it special ownership rights. The legality of that assertion never will be tested, because Packers’ management a few years ago changed the charter to clarify things.  If the Packers went out of business, all assets remaining after creditors were paid would go to a charitable foundation.  That would be a rather nice deal for charitable causes, because the franchise today is valued at a bit more than $1 billion, and debt is minimal.

• My $200 investment in reality was a donation. The share has no cash value and cannot be sold.  It can only be transferred to members of my immediate family.  I can attend the annual stockholders’ meeting with about 30,000 other fans, listen to the head coach, general manager, and finance officer field questions, and vote for the board of directors.  The board mostly is a figurehead body that includes Wisconsin business leaders and heads of sports organizations, plus a few former Packers players. They select an executive committee. The committee appoints a club president and approves the president’s choice of a general manager who runs the show. Because of the large number of interested shareholders, the annual meeting is held in Lambeau Field.

• When a hands-on billionaire owner such as  Jerry Jones of the Dallas Cowboys jumps up from his front-row perch in a luxury box and yells, “Run a damn screen,” an attempt at a screen pass is likely to occur soon on the field.  When I leap from my stool at Rhino’s Sports Bar with a similar demand, the message goes no further.  We little Packers owners have no power to influence policy or play.  A provision in stock offerings limits the number of shares a single entity can own; assuring the present limits on stockholder power will be permanent.

• Many current histories state or at least imply that E. L. (Curly) Lambeau, Packers co-founder and coach and general manager for 32 years, was a wonderful guy revered by all who knew him, and area residents rushed to name their new stadium for him in 1957. The facts, and the rumor mill when I lived in the Green Bay area, say otherwise.

• Lambeau, without question, was an important       figure in the early development of what now is the National Football League.  His teams pioneered the passing attack. He led the Packers into post-season exhibition games in the South and on the West Coast, often against the arch-rival Chicago Bears. The teams often traveled together. These contests created interest in pro football and helped pave the way for expansion teams some years later.  The rumor mill said a side benefit of the excursions to the coast were close encounters between Lambeau and several Hollywood starlets.  Giving credence to that story is the fact that one of Lambeau’s three wives was a former Miss California.  A personal history that included a couple of divorces probably was not exactly endearing to many football fans in Green Bay, most of whom were Roman Catholics who at that time considered divorce a serious no-no.

• Rumors abounded that Lambeau was notorious for late or no repayments of debts. Several times when I asked older De Pere residents (I edited the weekly newspaper there) if they knew Curly Lambeau, they smiled and pulled from their wallets scraps of paper that said, “IOU $10” (or $15 or $20).  Each was signed, “Earl Lambeau, or simply, "Curly.” None was marked paid.

• The famous founder-coach became somewhat of a traitor in local eyes when he abruptly left Green Bay in 1949 to coach the rival Chicago Cardinals.   The rumor mill maintained that whatever was in a depleted Packers treasury left town at about the same time.  Whether that is true or not, the Green Bay club was forced to make a major stock sale in 1950 to continue operations.

• What is now called an “historic playing field” was not named for Lambeau at the start.  When I attended the 1957 opener I was seated in City Stadium.  Some locals called it “new City Stadium” to make the distinction between it and the old arena near Green Bay East High School where the Packers played for years.  I heard of no one campaigning to name the new field for Lambeau. That did not happen for eight years, until after Lambeau died in 1965. 

• Both Lambeau and the other legendary Packers coach/general manager, Vince Lombardi, were known as stern taskmasters who often emphasized their instructions with profanity.  There the resemblance pretty much ended.  Lombardi did not earn the nickname “Saint Vincent” entirely because his teams won a lot of games. Unlike Lambeau who enjoyed lavish living in his spare time, Lombardi was known to be a workaholic and a devoted family man in what off-duty time he allowed himself. He attended a Catholic Mass every working day before heading to the office or the practice field, a ritual that considerably enhanced his standing with many Green Bay residents.

• When Lombardi came out of retirement to lead the Washington Redskins, there was none of the animosity among Packers fans that was kindled by Lambeau’s defection to Chicago.  The Green Bay fans were only disappointed that “Saint Vincent” chose did not return to the Packers.

• Lombardi often is portrayed as a ruthless bad guy by fans of rival teams, and other critics have contributed to that notion.  However, in memoirs published by former players, all speak of a healthy respect for the coach’s work ethic and demands that they follow suit.  Few disliked him.  Perhaps the most famous quote attributed to him, often by critics, was “Winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing.”  Historians now doubt Lombardi ever said that.

• It is often said that the club shareholders and citizens of Green Bay are hidebound traditionalists who have prevented Packers management from selling naming rights to the stadium to a commercial enterprise, as other pro clubs have done. The truth is that Green Bay area voters approved a name sale in a referendum on the question.  Packers’ executives are the traditionalists. They have ignored the will of the voters, preferring to give up millions of dollars of income in favor of maintaining the Lambeau Field name.
  

• The bitterness of the Packers-Chicago Bears rivalry is real, but historically there has been perhaps more of a love-hate relationship between the organizations' leaders than we are led to believe.  Many old Packers fans think that Bears’ long-time owner-coach George Halas actually was an ally who stood firmly against other big-city owners when frequent calls were made to move the Packers franchise to Milwaukee or some other more-lucrative market than the small city (population 50,000 in 1957, about 100,000 now) on the bay (others say Halas backed a move to Milwaukee, at least once).

• My rumor mill said that when Halas retired, Packers fans threw a bigger party for him in Green Bay than his friends did in Chicago.  It is a fact that Halas served as a pall bearer at Lambeau’s funeral. Some Packers fans were said to be offended, which seems silly indeed.

• Apparently, it is true that Lambeau and Halas refused to engage in the traditional post-game handshake during all or most of the 30 years when they were opposing coaches. One observer reports seeing “Papa Bear” shake his fist at Lambeau after a particularly hard-fought contest. Nevertheless, when the Bears faced serious financial difficulties in 1933, Lambeau loaned Halas half the Packers’ share of gate receipts ($1,500) from a game in Chicago. The act is said to have been a big factor in keeping Halas and the Bears solvent during that Depression time.

• Was some of the public inter-coach dislike displayed as part of a shrewd show by two skilled promoters seeking to increase interest in their struggling sport?  I think so.  If that is true, Halas and Lambeau were successful.  Packers-Bears games continue to draw big crowds and lots of attention from national television viewers.

• The cost of the coming Packers’ stock sale is rumored to be $250 per share.  The goal is to raise millions to pay for 7,000 additional seats at Lambeau Field, plus a new scoreboard and complete new electronic communication system.  Buyers will be making a donation just as I did in 1997.  Will the “worthless” shares sell? No doubt they will.  Some current stockholders already have said they’ll buy shares as gifts to their grandchildren.  They can’t very well buy their descendents a couple of season tickets, because the waiting list for tickets now stands at 81,000. Although Packers fans suffered through 27 years of mediocre play between the Lambeau and Lombardi eras, every game since the present stadium was built has been a sellout.

• Some fans have been waiting for years to become “owners” for the first time. Why?  That’s the “bragging rights” part of it, I guess. There is a certain family feeling about the whole thing. The letter signed by the  club president that arrived with my share of stock didn’t end with a standard line such as, “Thanks for your contribution.”  It said, Thank you for joining the Green Bay Packers.”

• Of course, any pro football fan with even a touch of rationality realizes the games are between one group of hired athletes and another. Nevertheless, Packers fans are notorious for saying, “We scored twice in the second quarter,” or, ”We blew the coverage on that play.”  There seems to be a personal feeling that “we” always  are part of the team of little guys going up against the big city slickers, even though that attitude is unrealistic.

• Packers fans seem to have a little special streak of dedication that sometimes borders on craziness.  After I had shown off my share of stock as much as possible, I told my son I was going to transfer the certificate to him so he could take a turn at bragging about being a pro team owner.  He said, “Don’t bother, Dad.  I bought one for myself.”

• Myths and facts pertaining to the career of Packers’ old-time pass catcher Don Hutson deserve mention in any discussion of Green Bay history, but this treatise is getting too lengthy for that. Television reporters who would know better if they did their homework, and show business personalities who can’t be expected to have a clue, routinely state that San Francisco 49ers’ receiver Jerry Rice was the greatest pass receiver of all time.  As sometimes is said in locker-room comparisons of talented players, “Rice was a great receiver, but he couldn’t carry Hutson’s jock.”

• Don Hutson not only was the greatest receiver ever to play the game, but he probably was the greatest player in pro football history.  I’ll try to prove that point with a post later in this season when the stars are right.

A Penn State Report Card

The sad story of allegations of child sexual abuse by a coach who had a 26-year career at football power Pennsylvania State University has brought forth a variety of comments on the educational institution and college athletics in general.  The players in the sordid drama deserve one of two grades—A or F—nothing else seems a good fit. 

Here’s the Geezer report card:

A—Mike McQueary, an assistant coach who as a graduate assistant  says he saw Coach Jerry Sandusky performing a sex act on a 10-year-old boy in the showers in a Penn State football building.  McQueary says he reported the incident to Joe Paterno, Sandusky’s boss, as he should have.

McQueary might have earned an A-plus had he called the cops himself back in 2002 when the incident occurred, but that would have been a lot to expect from one who was a low-level participant in the athletic program at the time and who had coaching aspirations. McQueary has been placed on indefinite leave with pay.  Penn State officials state he may have special legal status as a whistleblower.

F—Sandusky.  A grand jury indictment includes allegations that he sexually harassed or assaulted at least seven other minor boys over a 15-year period. Sandusky is free on bail after his arrest when the youth in the Penn State incident came forward recently and McQueary corroborated the story.

F—Head Coach Paterno. As an experienced administrator in charge of the program within which the alleged crime took place, Paterno should have ensured that police were notified.  Instead, the iconic head coach merely informed his immediate superior, Athletic Director Tim Curley, and a vice president, Gary Schultz, and did not follow up.

F—Curley and Schultz. They apparently did not advise Paterno to report the alleged crime, nor did they contact law enforcement authorities.  Both have been charged with failing to report the incident. Whether or not the 84-year-old Paterno will be similarly charged remains in doubt.

F—University President Graham Spanier. Investigations now under way probably will reveal whether he did or did not know of the incident.  Even if he did not, he deserves a failing grade for maintaining incredibly poor communications with his top assistants.

A—The Penn State Board of Trustees.  They promptly fired Coach Paterno and President Spanier, even though Paterno had offered to make this season his last after leading the football program for 46 years. Curley and Schultz earlier had removed themselves from the Penn State staff.

F—The Penn State students who demonstrated in favor of restoring Paterno to his coaching job.  More reprehensible are individual demonstrators who turned violent and significantly damaged property.  The latter should be arrested and expelled if they can be identified.  The remainder should, at the very least, be required to receive some special instruction on the relative values of greed (win at all costs) and integrity (do the right things).

A—The Penn State students who organized vigils as statements of sympathy for any boys who were victimized, and their families, and for all victims of sexual abuse.  They showed they understood and supported the values that Penn State long has proclaimed it teaches and practices.

F—A few commentators who implied or flatly stated that the incident unmasked widespread corruption in college sports.  The headlines accompanying these stories, and some of the sensational language in the tales, suggested that sexual abuse is rampant in university athletic programs, particularly football.

In more than five decades of closely following sports, including a few years as a sports editor, the Penn State affair is the only instance of sexual abuse of a minor by a coach that has come to my attention. Anyone who knows anything about sports writers knows that given even an inkling of such conduct, many of them would doggedly pursue the story. Child sexual abuse may be common in other institutions, including some well-publicized activities in religious organizations, but it most likely rarely has any association with college athletics.

A—The many critics who cast this incident as a classic case of greed versus integrity.  University officials should be the epitome of men and women who place honor and open and honest dealings above all else. They are among the ultimate role models in our society.  But too often, stadiums seating 80,000 to 100,000 fans and financial supporters and $100-million-dollar athletic budgets seem to be the motivating forces in these officials’ lives. 

At Penn State, a whole series of officials, going right to the top, appear to have participated in a cover up, and if they did so they endangered many children.  Obviously, all believed the straightforward action of reporting an alleged crime would somehow endanger the programs they so love.  Actually, doing the right thing probably would have enhanced the reputations of all concerned, except of course, for Sandusky. 

The bedrock issue in collegiate athletics, as it is today in the United States, is the power of the dollar in influencing decisions that should be made on the basis of ethical, not economic, factors.  Rewarding successful college football and basketball coaches (and athletic directors) with multi-million-dollar contracts is ridiculous.  University presidents could put a stop to the practice, but doing so would risk the wrath of enraged alums and might threaten their own bloated compensation packages.

Some like to draw a parallel between recruiting big-time football coaches and CEOs of major corporations.  “You have to pay top dollar to get a top performer,” that logic goes.  It may have some truth in the business world, but this tenet is ridiculous in the world of what is supposed to be amateur sport. 

It is difficult to find business execs with proven abilities to turn moribund enterprises around or to maintain other huge organizations at a highly profitable level.  It is not at all difficult to find football coaches who have come up through the high school and assistant coaching ranks with winning programs.  A whole lot of them are more than willing to head a major university program for a salary of a few hundred thousand dollars.  The trick should be to carefully examine the integrity of the candidates.  Those who pass that test might be worth a half million or so a year.  Six or seven million is outrageously unnecessary.

The Geezer often has laid the blame on college and university presidents for allowing greed to direct the athletic programs at their schools.  Perhaps the Penn State experience shows that position has been wrong.  The blame might be better placed on members of Boards of Trustees and Boards of Regents. They are where the buck stops, since presidents, unfortunately, are too often complicit in the abuses.

Come to think of it, the Penn State Board of Trustees deserves a bit more that an A for their resolute actions in the football program affair.  Let’s hear it for them:

Hip, Hip, Hooray. . . Siss Boom Bah . . . PENN STATE  TRUSTEES . . . Rah, Rah, Rah!  

Get on Down There

This is an unqualified endorsement of Applebee’s Veterans Day offer.  The national restaurant chain once again will provide free meals on November 11 to all who have served or are now serving our nation in the U.S. military.

If you’re a veteran of any kind, with an honorable discharge, go to Applebee’s on Friday for your choice of a free dinner from a very good menu.  If you’re on active duty, ditto.  If you’re not a veteran or on active duty, but know someone who is, grab him or her and take them to Applebee’s. That will show, in a very personal way, your appreciation of the sacrifices service people have made and continue to make.

The Veterans Day offer should apply throughout the U.S. and may include Canada.  It would be a good idea to check at a location near you to be sure the free meals are available there and learn what type of identification is needed to qualify.

In the future, you may want to introduce your favorite dinner companions to Applebee’s.  This company deserves your business.

___________________________________________

This commercial message was written, authorized, and posted by the Gabby Geezer, who may be found about noon on Nov. 11 enjoying a steak dinner at Applebee’s in Plainwell, Michigan, USA.

Ahead of the Game

(Lately, many notices have appeared urging us to protest the behavior of megabanks by transferring our accounts to local financial institutions.  The Geezer was ahead of that game. Following is an abridged version of his Jan. 26, 2010 comments—the original appeared here a full 21 months ago. As predicted, the big bank that lost Sandy’s account has not collapsed, but perhaps now with millions joining the movement the bankers will get the message.)

Take It from the Bank

Of course, the bank president will just laugh at the loss of our business, if by some strange quirk of fate it comes to his attention.  But our action will be symbolic.  We are going to transfer Sandy’s checking account from a big bank to join mine at a little credit union.

We little guys aren’t moving our business out of greed, although often we can get better rates locally.  We’re doing it because we’re mad as hell at greedy big bankers.

We ought to be. In 2008, the median U.S. household income was $50,303.  It no doubt will be lower when the numbers are in for 2009 (Ed note: it was).  The average professional employee (broker, sales staffer, trader) compensation at JP Morgan Chase was $279,000 in 2008.  The bankers gave themselves a raise in 2009, upping average compensation to $379,000.  Wow!  The average Morgan staffer got an income increase double what the average American family must subsist on.

JP Morgan Chase was given $25 billion dollars of taxpayer money in the fall of 2008 to ensure the firm would be healthy.  Wouldn’t it follow that the guys who were making a quarter million or more a year were the same bozos who were making the firm unhealthy? They should have been disciplined, not rewarded with big bonuses.

The medicine worked.  Morgan paid back the $25 billion.  The taxpayers even earned some profit on the deal.  Unfortunately, although the patient survived, it didn’t start doing what the doctors envisioned.  The idea was that the propped-up big banks would lend cash to stimulate business, which in turn would save or create jobs.

The bankers quickly engineered a payback to avoid government control of their compensation packages.  They made the money to do that in investment banking, and continued a lot of the risky stuff that got us into a financial crisis in the first place.  Instead of ramping up typical business lending they tightened things up in that area. They gave the surplus funds to each other, rather than helping their country out of recession.

Was Morgan an isolated case?  Goldman Sachs got $10 billion from Uncle Sam to stay in business.  It was one of the first to make a full repayment.  It should be better managed than some competitors, because at Goldman average professional compensation was a mind-boggling $317,000 in 2008.  It increased to $498,000 in 2009.  Meanwhile, nationwide unemployment moved above 10 percent.

The big bankers deserve our ire.  Some even admit it.  At a hearing before the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, Brian Moynihan, Bank of America chief executive officer and president, said, “Over the course of the crisis, we as an industry caused a lot of damage.”

That’s right on.  Politicians, Republicans and Democrats, over the past twenty years stripped away needed regulations or looked away as questionable activities were taking place.  But, just because politicians gave financiers a license to steal doesn’t mean the liberated bankers were forced to plunder.  They could have applied their own ethical standards—if they had any-- to daily practices.

We need Congress to clamp down hard on the bad guys who betrayed us.  Democrats will lose the support of a lot of voters if they simply continue running around yelling “yes, we can” make financial institutions work for all Americans. They need to do it. And Republicans need to identify some common-sense reforms they can support and get with the program. 

What Price Freedom?

Frankly, it was somewhat of a blow to national pride.

Last week, Hamas, which controls what passes for a Palestinian government, released one Israeli soldier it had been holding prisoner in return for the release of 1,027 Palestinians from Israeli jails.

Two days ago, an alleged spy who holds dual U.S.-Israeli citizenship was released by Egypt in exchange for a mere 25 Egyptians imprisoned in Israel.

That incredible disparity in exchange rates could be construed as an indication of the low value assigned to American citizens in the Middle East. Wonder how many Syrians it would take to spring a  French double-agent?

Boo! and Poo

It’s a good thing--Halloween hijinks have been toned down so much over the years they hardly exist anymore.  Back in the 40s and 50s failing to provide a proper treat could result in some serious tricks.

In many communities, “Gate Night” produced various levels of damage and civic disruption by older youths, who perpetrated some strange acts apparently just for the hell of it.

Soaping windows was fairly innocuous.  Tossing trash onto Main Street from cars driven by juveniles set the bar a little higher.  Actually tearing gates off fenced areas to fulfill the Gate Night tradition was not uncommon. There were other types of property damage.  Local police gave chase when they spotted miscreants, but they were outnumbered by bands of roving youths and had little chance of apprehending anybody.

The police even could be the target. My father recalled Gate Night escapades back in the early 1900s when he was growing up in Wausau, Wisconsin, long before police had squad cars.  They traveled by bicycle when in hot pursuit.  His favorite story:

A group of boys spread horse manure liberally in an alley between two garages.  They strung a sturdy cord between the buildings about four feet above the mess, and then lured an officer into chasing them into the alley on his bike at full speed.  The result was not pretty for one of Wausau’s finest.

A somewhat similar Halloween story told in my hometown involved the lads who lived in "Jersey City," a community a short distance outside the city limits. The victim was "Shorty" Ruff, a small man whose outhouse was a favorite tip-over target during Gate Night forays by neighborhood youths.

After several years of outhouse restoration projects, Shorty decided enough was enough. Early on Gate Night, he took a seat in his outhouse with shotgun in hand, ready to scare away the most dedicated vandals who might show up.

Legend has it that Shorty fell asleep. The tippers appeared and had their way with the outhouse as usual. Shorty fell into the pit. He was said to be uninjured but considerably more aromatic when he emerged.

Cops, outhouse users, and all the rest of us can be happy these sorts of things won’t happen this year.  Or will they? Only the witches’ brew can tell us for sure.

What Have We Become?

I don’t remember all the details, but I can clearly recall the scene on VJ (Victory Over Japan) day in my hometown.  My father took me on the two-block walk from our home to the downtown area.

It seemed as though every ambulatory citizen was there.  Democrats, Republicans, Independents, Socialists, and perhaps even a Communist or two were hugging each other, slapping each other on the back, shaking hands, and dancing in the middle of the street.  Loud music emanated from the several taverns in the small business district.  Dad said everyone who wanted a free drink had no problem finding someone to buy it.

Joy was general.  No one was asking any questions about the ethics of actions that ended World War II, including atomic bombings.  No one was questioning our military strategy, or the intentions or operations of any of our allies.  Some of that came later, but for the moment Americans were just plain happy that the killing finally had stopped.

In recent days, American involvement in two wars ended.  The eight-month civil war in Libya reached the last of its final days when rebels killed the nation’s tyrannical leader.  Almost simultaneously, President Obama declared our military work in Iraq over after eight years of struggle in a war that every poll showed was unpopular with a majority of our people.

Were there huge celebrations?  Parades?  Loud music? Free drinks?  Not at all.  We were immediately treated to a volley of carping and bitching by various politicians and commentators.

Our NATO allies, primarily the United Kingdom and France, who did the heavy lifting in Libya, where charged in the United Nations and some American media with violating their charter to provide air power to protect Libyan civilians.  What were the British and French pilots supposed to do?  It seems wildly impractical to suggest they should land when they spotted an armored vehicle and ask the driver if he intended to shoot rebels, innocent civilians, or just a couple of rabbits before they launched a rocket.

From the right came complaints that the U.S. did too little in Libya, and never should have let allies assume the leadership in the military actions.  From the left came assertions that we should have shunned any involvement at all, and had run a huge risk of getting into another Viet Nam or Afghanistan quagmire. From other quarters came charges that helping the rebels would surely result in replacing a secular dictator with Libyan leadership controlled by religious fanatics.

We did have the leading role in Iraq, so the critics had to shelve that complaint and come up with a few new ones.  One was that Obama played a political trick to gain support before the next elections.  That is a strange position, indeed, considering he made a clear promise during his presidential campaign to get us out of Iraq. Apparently, keeping a promise nowadays is an evil act.

Others complained about leaving four or five thousand contract guards in Iraq to protect our diplomats and other civilian workers.  They cautioned that relying on contractors for security purposes was a serious danger.

What should we do?  Let the remaining known thugs in Iraq wipe out a segment of our diplomatic and foreign aid corps?  The prime minister of Iraq refused to continue to allow legal protection for American troops; thus it seems quite logical to turn to contractors to provide needed para-military power.

Probably the most unbelievable criticism is that Obama acted precipitously and failed to execute an orderly withdrawal.  Good grief; our withdrawal has been in the planning stages for at least two years.  Our administration is well into planning a withdrawal from Afghanistan, with a target date some three years in the future.  That would seem to indicate the people in the White House and Pentagon are practicing careful planning.

This critic thinks three years is way too long to wait for the Afghan withdrawal.  I hope that doesn’t make me as un-American as the rest of those idiots who can’t take even a day off from their political agendas and negative attacks to celebrate the end of a war and praise our young men and women for their role in bringing it about.

Of course, World War II was much larger, although it lasted only about half as long as the Iraq adventure.  And, American involvement in Libya was relatively minor and resulted in no loss of life. No matter the scope or length of the conflicts, however, lives were put at risk and dollars were spent that could have been used for better purposes.  

But yet the spirit in the country seems very different from the way people felt at the end of hostilities in 1945.  Have all the wars since then caused us to no longer feel any personal connection to military actions?

For the Record

It’s October, and the boys of summer are jousting once again for the World Championship of Baseball. Where but in the U.S.A. could the champs be crowned?  No other nation has the same extensive professional league structure and widespread amateur interest in the sport.

In more than 100 years, baseball has caught some public fancy in Canada, Japan, and parts of Latin America, but gets little or no attention elsewhere. In the U.S., the sport gradually has lost its position as the national game to football.  Why?  Basically, baseball games are slow-paced with long intervals of nothing much happening interspersed with a few moments of furious action.  In other words, watching baseball is boring most of the time. It’s also getting expensive to go out to the old ballpark—this summer fans had to fork over $6.00 for a hotdog in the Chicago White Sox’ stadium.

Perhaps as a way to add some interest, statistics expanded in scope and depth as the baseball years rolled by.  From the start number crunchers have provided fans with batting averages and totals for such essentials as home runs, runs batted in, strikeouts, and walks.  For pitchers, they gave us won-lost records, strikeout and walk totals, innings pitched, and (relatively recently) earned-run averages.  Now the keepers of the record books seem to have gone mad.

The Geezer watched a playoff game on TV a couple of nights ago.  A pair of announcers filled every second of spare time with numbers.  There was a lot of spare time as the teams changed pitchers whenever a hitter looked threatening. Viewers learned how many pitches a hurler had thrown in every conceivable situation, how every batter fared historically against every pitcher, and the speed of fastballs in miles per hour.  We even were treated to something the announcers labeled a “productive out.”

Where there are numbers there will be records.  Someone, sometime won the most games, hit the most home runs, and drew the most walks, or was the first to do something or other.  These are significant things to baseball fans.  However, we can get along well without knowing that Justin Verlander retired an average of four left-handed hitters with an outside slider every time he lasted five innings when he started a game in 2009.

Negative records perhaps are atop the pile of unimportant baseball matters. For example, do we really care if Los Angeles Dodger infielder Eugenio Valez this season set the modern-day record for nonpitchers for consecutive times at bat without a hit?  Perhaps Mrs. Valez does, if there is a Mrs. Valez, but I don’t.  And I’m sure Mr. Valez would rather not have his performance noted in the record books for all to see.

Other types of trivial baseball records sound positive, but mean very little.  High on that list are accounts of the first person to do some obscure thing or other or the only one to perform a trivial feat. The Geezer holds that sort of baseball record—one that probably never will be equaled.

I was the only person ever to play in both the junior and senior championship games in the same Wisconsin State Amateur Baseball Tournament. Wow!

Some might be awed by this achievement.  Wisconsin has held amateur championship tournaments for 63 years. Back when I played in the 1950s every little town and many companies sponsored teams.  Today, although interest in baseball is much diminished, Wisconsin still has about 60 amateur teams concentrated in northern and western parts of the state.  So my record might be considered a biggie, but how I earned it is as bizarre as the honor is unimportant. It was a pure case of being in the right places at the right times.

Through some mysterious manipulations by the chamber of commerce, my hometown (Tomahawk, Wisconsin) was selected to host the 1953 state amateur tournament.  At that time, tournament sponsors invited teams to compete in two divisions, also by a somewhat mysterious process.

Players in the junior division could not be older than 17.  They played seven-inning contests.  The senior teams had no age restrictions, and apparently few or no requirements about who might be considered an amateur or a regular member of the team.  All the teams, junior and senior, were known to add any talented players they could find to beef up rosters for the tournament.

I don’t know if the sponsors considered it a courtesy to the host city or needed a couple of teams to fill the brackets, but that year they invited one team from Tomahawk to participate in each division.  Apparently, the invitation came somewhat unexpectedly.  Managers had to hustle to assemble the two teams.  No one expected the locals to win anything—just play one game and take a bow after the defeat.

I was working that summer in a National Tea store.  Bob Koth, a local businessman involved with American Legion baseball, showed up and convinced my boss to let me off work because he needed a catcher for the junior division team he was assembling. I had played Legion and high school ball and was 17.  The first game was the next afternoon. Our ragtag nine wore the Legion team uniforms.  We won.  We won the next day.  To the amazement of one and all we were headed into the championship game.

The performance of the senior Tomahawk team perhaps was more amazing.  Competing against teams loaded with former minor league professional players, the local all-stars also won their first two games, which were nine-inning affairs played at night, and advanced to the championship game.

Our junior team had a big problem.  We only had two pitchers and it would have been a disaster to put one of them back on the mound with inadequate rest.  Mr. Koth learned that high school pitcher Dave Lemke was returning from a trip to Chicago the day before the title game.  He met Lemke at the train station and gave him a briefing and a uniform.  We had our pitcher, a guy with a strong arm but not as much experience as the first two we used.

Lefty Lemke was superb for six innings.  He was up against a team of stars from the Wisconsin Rapids area, a hotbed of amateur baseball.  One outfielder had signed a professional contract after a tryout.  We were tied 1-1 going into the last inning. Then we broke down defensively, and the visitors wound up winning going away for the championship.

I barely got home and shed my uniform when the manager of the senior Tomahawk team phoned.  His catcher had been called up by the National Guard and he couldn’t find another one when he checked with all of the area mens teams.  Would I play in the championship game that night? I did. We took a terrible thumping from a team that competed in a Milwaukee industrial league. 

Two championship game appearances in one day—two sound defeats. Not a record to be pointed to with great pride. But my very own record, nonetheless.

Recently, two local authors published a 550-page “History of Tomahawk Sports” book that covers teams and events from 1897 to 1980.  The book includes records and noteworthy accomplishments by athletes while they played on school teams and afterward in college or elsewhere.  Yes, I’m in there.  My appearances are in those standard pictures of a bunch of kids lined up to pose for high school football and baseball team photos. 

My 1953 amateur baseball record does not appear in the book.  The authors obviously have a keen perception of the importance of things.  

  

A National Disgrace

Last Friday marked ten years of warfare in Afghanistan since we and several allies invaded that land.  The anniversary, which was preceded by the loss of billions of dollars and thousands of lives for no good reason after the successful initial attack, was largely ignored by news media and those who usually delight in claiming the spotlight.

Some Afghan protesters marched in Kabul with signs urging Americans to get out of their country. That was about it. One of our top generals said he planned no special event to mark the anniversary.  Representatives of the White House said President Obama might issue some sort of written statement, but planned no major speech and was not scheduled to participate in any commemorative events.  The usual suspects who organize American demonstrations were busy dispatching their troops to march on Wall Street protesting unfair taxation and actions, or lack of actions, by bankers and corporations.

Pundits explained that our political leaders were too busy worrying about unemployment in America to be distracted by foreign wars.  Maybe our leaders ought to consider there could be a link between the two.  The billions of dollars we are throwing away building roads, bridges, irrigation systems, and various buildings in Afghanistan would be better spent improving our crumbling infrastructure at home.  Reallocating that money would provide lots of jobs for Americans, and what they built would not be available later to benefit religious fanatics such as those who will regain control of Afghanistan after we leave.

There are connections between the war and our economic situation on more personal levels. Consider the case of U.S. Army Corporal Joseph VanDreumel, who was killed in Afghanistan in August.  Read between the lines a little.  VanDreumel was 32 years old when he joined the Army. He left behind a widow and two children, Angel, 10, and Skyler, 8. After years of steady employment in various jobs, VanDreumel was unemployed when he enlisted. Thirty-two-year-old men with families do not enlist as privates in the army if they can find any other kind of suitable employment.  I shudder imagining going through army boot camp at age 32. It was hard enough for me at 22.

Skyler VanDreumel honors his dead father (Grand Rapids Press)

My read is that VanDreumel did what he believed he had to do to support his family.  He risked, and gave, his life doing so. He was a true hero. Doesn’t anybody in power give a damn that our wrongheaded policies force people like him into such desperate situations?

“Each man’s death diminishes me, for I am involved in mankind . . .” Donne’s famous words apply to all of us.  That is, they apply unless you are a politician, general or admiral, or an arms manufacturer.  They, probably with a few exceptions, care not at all if others die in Afghanistan or elsewhere. And you will find none of them endangering their own lives in battle.

The current plan is to maintain troops and nation-building programs in Afghanistan at least until 2014.  You can be sure some activities financed by American taxpayers will continue after that. Why don’t we do ourselves a favor and simply get out now?  Staying there wasting our treasure while the killing goes on, and then having the national gall to ignore the whole situation on a significant anniversary, is disgraceful.

     

In Grateful Memory

Capt. Drew E. Russell (U.S. Army), 25, Scotts, Michigan. Killed by a rocket-propelled grenade In Kandahar Province, Afghanistan, October 8, 2011.

A Blogging Birthday

The year has been slipping by so quickly that an important (at least to a few) milestone almost was neglected.  This is the fifth anniversary of the Gabbygeezer blog.  It started back in 2006 with, of all things, a little story about how it started.  Since then, 300 little stories have appeared, discounting a dozen or so that defy classification as stories, or much of anything else.

Which story generated the most favorable comments?  Hands down it was “Give Yourself a Proper Sendoff,” referenced in my profile on the right-hand column of this page.  That story describes why each of us should write our own obituary, and how we can do it to maximize self-aggrandizement and still be truthful. It uses my obituary (now somewhat out of date) as an example.  Most of the commentators said the story left them laughing, or at least mildly amused.

Which of the 300 stories attracted the most readers?  That is impossible to determine.  But one story was republished several times. The story repeated here, of my business venture in my hometown of Tomahawk, Wisconsin, first appeared as a Gabbygeezer post early in 2006.  It soon was published again in the Tomahawk Leader newspaper. Like the obituary tale and 165 others, it then appeared in my memoir, “Days With The Dads,” in 2008. Shortly thereafter, the Tomahawk Historical Society included it as part of a book it published. 

Here’s the story, once again seeking a few more readers:

A Very Small Business

As small businesses went in Tomahawk, Wisconsin, mine had to be one of the smallest. And as business owners went, at age 10, I was probably one of the youngest.

In the summer of 1946, Billy “Barrel” Schmidt and I were hanging around my dad’s tailor shop voicing the usual complaint of youth that there was nothing to do. Barrel’s uncle Louie, who ran the Central Drug Store in front of my dad’s shop, suggested we do something useful and start up a shoe shining business to make a little money.

We thought that was a pretty good idea. My dad found a shoeshine box somewhere, bought us a few supplies, and we were in business. The partnership lasted only a couple of weeks. Barrel decided going swimming at Crystal Lake and other typical Tomahawk summer activities beat heck out of work. He left me as the sole proprietor of the business.

One of the group of downtown businessmen who met every morning for coffee at Rouman’s Restaurant told my dad he thought the Hotel Tomahawk once had a shoeshine stand in the lobby. Sure enough, it was in storage at the hotel. Dad got it for me, and I hauled it out in front of Central Drug every morning, ready for business.

My only advertising was two cardboard signs attached to the arms of the chair. They read: “Shoe Shine 15 cents, other shoe free.”

This postcard showed me at rest

When business at the stand was slow, which was often, I toted the shine box to the local barber shops (I think there were three in those days) looking for customers. My recollection is that the only shop where I did much business was Charlie O’Rourke’s. That’s where I got my hair cut, and Mr. O’Rourke returned the favor by trying to gently persuade the men awaiting their turn in his chair to let me shine their shoes.

I think my dad suggested my other regular “house call.” If my mom had found out about it, the business would have ended right then and there. On Friday nights, Dad worked until 9 p.m. so Mom thought I was tending to business at my stand until we came home together. Actually, I was at Scorch’s Bar with my shine box. Business there was great, often netting me $2 or $3 for a couple of hours work—big money in those days for a little kid.

At 15 cents a customer, making that kind of cash depended on how much beer was flowing at Scorch’s (usually quite a lot) and some help from my friends.

My friends were two single ladies who worked at the A&P Store and always showed up at Scorch’s about 6:30 on Friday nights. They sort of adopted me, and since the males at the bar were trying to adopt them, they convinced a lot of drunks to get shoe shines—and woe to him who didn’t include a tip in the payment. One slightly absent-minded, or more likely very inebriated, guy paid me to shine his shoes twice in the span of 10 minutes!

I also did some “carry out” business. The best customers were Myron Veith and “Bev” Beverson, who owned The Gift Box across the street from my stand. On Saturday mornings, they left the door to their upstairs apartment unlocked and set out a half dozen pairs of shoes for me. I carried them across the street, shined them up, and took them back.

Another regular customer was Terry Small, who worked at the Quality Meat Market owned by his parents. Terry always dropped off two pairs of shoes for my attention, also on Saturdays. This was easy to recall because Terry was a very big man. His shoes were size 13 EEE. However, he always paid 25 cents a pair, so I didn’t complain about needing to use extra polish and elbow grease.

I worked all summer and occasionally in the fall after starting the seventh grade. Then work got a little old, and in the spring playing baseball was a lot more attractive than popping shoeshine rags and wielding brushes. I sold the stand and my supplies for $5 to Bob Gilley, an older man with some physical handicaps. Mr. Gilley shined shoes at the stand in the entryway of Nick’s Casket Factory on Wisconsin Avenue for quite a few years. He, however, was not known to solicit business in barbershops or bars.

Photographer Claude Venne gave my business a small measure of fame when he sneaked up on me one day when I was taking one of my frequent breaks, reading a comic book and eating a popsicle. Venne made his photo into postcards, which he sold at the Tomahawk Drug Store across the street with some other local scenes he had snapped. He had a note on the shoeshine card display that said something like, “Business is lousy, ain’t it?”

Business wasn’t too lousy. In addition to paying for popsicles, I saved nearly $100 from my summer’s work 60 years ago. I still had the money in the Bradley Bank seven years later to help pay for my first year at the University of Wisconsin. In those days, tuition for one semester at UW was $90.

* * * * * * * * *

Five years from now, I’ll rerun the most-republished little story from the previous five years. That’s a promise.

Come Back For a Look

The "Newer Knowledge" post that appeared here three days ago got a large number of visitors.  If you're among those who were interested in the topic, you may want to revisit the item.  Thanks to blogging buddy Alan G., it now includes a video showing operations of a single-stream recycling plant.

In Grateful Memory

                                             

Staff  Sgt. Nicholas A. Sprovtsoff (U.S. Marine Corps), 28, Davison, Michigan. Killed in combat in Helmand Province, Afghanistan, September 28, 2011.

Newer Knowledge

Sometime back, the geezer spoke of pride in having worked with scientists at the Forest Products Laboratory (FPL) in Madison, WI, who were searching for better ways to recycle wastepaper.  However, I said “to my knowledge” the processes they developed had not been put into use.

Like much knowledge, mine now has improved after I took the time to thoroughly check into the situation.  It turns out that an important part of the work by the Forest Service researchers was put into practice in Europe several decades ago.

The scientists invented a new method, which received a public patent, for separating plastics from paper in household trash.  They thus solved one of the technical problems inhibiting large-scale, mechanized recycling schemes.

In 1979 a plant using the FPL technique was set up in The Netherlands. It processes 50,000 tons of material a year.  Another plant with the same capacity began operations in Sweden the following year.  The equipment manufacturer later established a large-scale pilot plant in Japan.

It has not been economical to use the technology in the U.S., but that could change in the future as recycling systems become more automated.  That future may not be far away.  My local newspaper, the Kalamazoo Gazette, recently reported that a township in Kalamazoo County was switching to “single-stream” recycling.  Residents there no longer will have to separate paper, glass, metals, and plastics for processing.  They put everything into one large container and the materials are separated in a sophisticated processing plant.  Such systems are in use in several parts of the U.S.

The video shows a current "single-stream" processing system in use today.  

These systems are not identical to a pilot plant in Madison with which I was involved in the early 1970s. There Forest Service researchers worked with  Heil Company and City of Madison employees to explore the effectiveness of reducing the size of household trash by hammer milling and then separating materials by various methods. However, the approach using dry separation methods and several features of the two types of systems are the same. 

The Madison system took it one step further.  It was designed to take all household refuse, including garbage.  The separation process neutralized contaminants. Very few people were needed in the processing plant. 

It was exciting to handle information activities for scientists pioneering recycling research.  It’s good to know now that some of the concepts they explored 40 years ago have advanced through research and development into use.