Pronounced Chol-gosh

another rough draft of another chapter created today. It’s becoming clear, write and rewrite, and write and rewrite. Much research today to achieve a few paragraphs

this chapter is titled: Pronuonced Chol-Gosh

As W.W. Crenshaw made his way through the misty haze of Seattle, on route to his meeting with Connell, he sensed there was something going on in the city. People were gathering and talking. Dour faced residents talked in sad whispering tones. A man Crenshaw recognized as a fellow resident of the Columbia Hotel approached him. “Hey Crenshaw have you heard the news”?

Crenshaw replied “Enlighten me, it seems everyone is in sour spirits this morning”

“I talked to a guy who was at the Western Union. President McKinley is dead”

Crenshaw fired back “I thought he was going to be okay”

The man, a prospector from Missouri named Caldwell, said “we all thought so too. It just come in over the wire. He didn’t make it”.

He nodded at Caldwell and told him he had an important appointment. Crenshaw continued to scurry down the muddy street. His intuition told him his meeting with Morris J. Connell just might be the life changing opportunity he had been waiting for. He was saddened about the news of McKinley’s demise. Yet he knew he needed to stay focused, to keep his eye on the prize.

McKinley arrived in Buffalo, New York on September 5, 1901 for the Pan-American exposition. The exposition featured a 389 foot “Electric Tower” powered by nearby Niagara Falls. President McKinley had been scheduled for a two day visit to the Expo. The President was fresh off guiding the United States to victory in the Spanish-American War. He had entered his second term in office as one of the most popular presidents in recent years. The president had given a speech to a crowd of 116,000 enthusiastic patriots. It was declared to be the largest crowd to ever witness a presidential speech. That same evening there was a fireworks display that culminated in in a burst of pyrotechnics that spelled out “Welcome President McKinley, Chief of our Nation and Our Empire.”

The next day the president had scheduled a meet and greet with his constituents. His personal secretary George B. Cortelyou had tried to twice cancel the event. He warned the president against meeting the public in an open forum. Cortelyou had serious concerns about the security of holding such an event. He warned McKinley that it might give a potential assassin an opportunity to attack the president. McKinley insisted on going ahead with the event. In the sweltering late summer heat a long line of people gathered outside the Temple of Music. It was set up to be a greeting line. Each person waiting in the line was afforded the opportunity of meeting the president in person. At 4:00 pm the line of people began moving forward. McKinley was enjoying shaking hands and greeting the crowd.

Near the front of the line was twenty eight year old Leon Czolgosz. Czolgosz was a reserved and gloomy former steel worker. An avowed anarchist, he had arrived in Buffalo a few days earlier and had purchased .32 caliber Iver Johnson revolver. This was the same weapon another anarchist had used to assassinate Italian King Umberto I the previous summer. Czolgosz later recalled “it was in my heart; there was no escape for me. All these people seemed to be bowing to the great ruler. I made up my mind to kill that ruler.” The Secret Service and Buffalo police took little notice when Czolgosz sauntered up to the president. McKinley smiled and extended his hand, Czolgosz raised the pistol and fired two shots at point blank range. There was an instant of almost complete quiet, like the hush that follows the crack of thunder. McKinley retreated a step and a sallowness overtook his features. The stillness was broken when James “Big Jim” Parker, a tall African American man who was in the reception line, punched Czolgosz, preventing him from firing a third shot.

Czolgosz was jumped by a mob of soldiers and detectives. They began beating the assassin to a bloody pulp. The mortally wounded president ordered them to stop the beating. He stumbled back and on to the floor, blood pouring from his stomach. “My wife,” he managed to say to Cortelyou. “Be careful how you tell her-oh be careful!” One of the bullets ricocheted off McKinley’s suit button and hit his sternum, causing only minor damage. The other had struck his abdomen and passed clear through his stomach. A surgeon managed to suture the stomach wounds and stop the bleeding, but was unable to locate the bullet, which he assumed was lodged somewhere near the presidents spine. At first it looked like McKinley may make a full recovery. His diagnosis was so positive that Vice President Theodore Roosevelt took off for a camping trip in the Adirondack Mountains. Roosevelt told reporters “you may say that I am absolutely sure the president will recover”. By September 13, McKinley’s condition had become increasingly desperate. Gangrene had formed on the walls of his stomach and brought a severe case of blood poisoning. In a matter of hours he grew weak and began losing consciousness. At 2:15 a.m. on September 14, he died with his wife Ida by his side. Czolgosz was held by the Buffalo police and was interrogated for several days. The Michigan native said “I don’t believe in the Republican form of government, and I don’t believe we should have any rulers”. He had stalked McKinley for two days in Buffalo and had nearly shot the president when he arrived by train on September 5. The police and detectives never established a link between Czolgosz and any anarchist groups. They concluded he had acted alone in the assassination. In his confession he was adamant about this fact. “I killed President McKinley because I done my duty,” he said. Despite his professing to acting alone his confession led to a sweeping roundup of political radicals. In Chicago, a dozen staff members from the anarchist newspaper “free society” were arrested. On September 10, police also picked up the anarchist agitator Emma Goldman, whose speeches Czolgosz had cited as a key influence in his decision to assassinate McKinley. Justice came swiftly to Czolgosz. His murder trial started on September 23, a little more than a week after the death of McKinley. He was found guilty and sentenced to death just three days later. He was executed in the electric chair at New York’s Auburn prison on October 29, 1901. In the moments before his execution he said “I killed the president for the good of the laboring people, the good people. I am not sorry for my crime.”

As W.W. Crenshaw turned off Columbia Street and began walking past the commission houses of Western Avenue, his thoughts shifted to the world changing events happening across the continent in Buffalo. He had admired the president during his first term. He thought Mr. McKinley to be a likeable fellow whose Republican ideals seemed to favor the business climate. America had recovered from the great panic of 1893. Under McKinley it seemed the United States was positioned to become the premier world power in the new century. Crenshaw’s thoughts shifted back to his forthcoming meeting with Morris J. Connell. As he located the office of the Connell Brothers at 817 Western Avenue, events were unfolding in Buffalo, New York. A man was suddenly thrust to the forefront of the American landscape. A man whose image would one day be carved in to the side of a mountain in South Dakota.

On September 14, 1901, Theodore Roosevelt took the oath of office as the 26th president of the United States in the library of Ansley Wilcox’s house in Buffalo. He had been contacted at his camping trip and had been summoned to go to Buffalo immediately. At 42 years old he was and remains the youngest person to ever take the oath of office. He succeeded President William McKinley, who had succumbed to an assassin’s bullet earlier that day. For Roosevelt, who had hoped to rise to the presidency someday, it was “a dreadful thing to come into the Presidency in this way.” In typical Roosevelt fashion, however, he continued, “Here is the task, and I have got to do it to the best of my ability.” Three years later, he was elected to a full term in his own right. Roosevelt had a lasting impact on the nation, expanding the powers of the presidency, advocating consumer protection laws and regulation of big business, supporting conservation, and asserting America’s authority abroad.

Also on this day, September 14, 1901, W.W. Crenshaw at age twenty four was hired as a salesman by the firm of Connell Brothers Merchant Brokers in Seattle. Crenshaw had made a very positive impression on the elder Connell. Connell took Crenshaw down to the pier where the fog shrouded ship had docked earlier. Everyone was talking about the death of the president. Not much was known about the forty two year old president that had just been given the oath of office. Crenshaw was excited to board the ship with Mr. Connell. Connell told him they would be able to tour the ship and watch the cargo be unloaded. Crenshaw paused, had a thought, and then said to Connell “That’s three presidents in thirty six years, sir. All shot at point blank range with pistols. I think it’s time to think about beefing up our national security service”. As I write this I wonder how much different our world would look if Ronald Reagan in 1980, Bill Clinton in 1995, and Barack Obama in 2015 had all been assassinated. This was how the world looked to Crenshaw and Connell as they peered in to cargo hold number one. Its bounty full of wool socks and heavy clothing that would soon be sold and on its way to the vast expanse of the Yukon.

The Fiasco in Pasco 1974

huffingpuffpost

Forty one years ago this week I was treated to a free nights lodging and a complementary bowl of Kelloggs Corn Flakes by the kind citizens of Richland, Washington. At dawn they transferred us in handcuffs to the Freddie English Home for Wayward Children. I was locked in solitary confinement and waited for my dad to come bail me out. Earlier thatday, as we rose to the crest of I-90 near Echo Glen, we were enjoying a bowl and some ice cold Millers in the bottle. I remember thinking life could never get any better. It was a sunny summer day and we were on our way to the Tri Cities to watch the races. I remember thinking how great it was to catch a buzz at 9:30 in the morning. I thoughtthe day would keep getting better and better. Imagine my dismay when at 11:30 that night the steel…

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Underwood Typewriter

Alice Davies was excited to send her son Mike off to his first day of work. It was the summer of 1942,  Mike was about to turn thirteen. This was going to be his first official day on the payroll at his father’s firm. Ever since he was young Mike had been accompanying his father to the office. Mike’s father, Myron Davies owned a company that exported fresh fruit and vegetables. Since his business crossed the international date line Myron often had to

go to the office on Sunday’s. Myron Davies was serious about his business. He was stern and had little patience or time to spend on his relationship with his son. These Sunday outings to the office were one of the only ways Mike could connect with his father. Years later Mike would recall with fondness the Sunday’s he spent in the offices of M.L Davies Company with his father.

Myron was more relaxed on Sunday as often he and Mike were the only people there. Myron would spend his time attending to his duties. He would busy himself checking the telex machine, writing letters, and would work on quotes for future orders. Mike would enjoy adventuring around the office.

Mike would feed paper in to the typewriters and practice typing. He did this under the careful watch of Myron. His father warned him not to press more than one key at a time. Mike had practiced on the Underwood machines quite a bit. He become a proficient typist at the age of eight. One Sunday he fed a sheet of M.L Davies letterhead in to the 1935 Underwood Champion typewriter. The next day Mike brought his letter to school for show and tell. This is the letter that was passed around his class that day.

M.L. Davies Company

Distributors Fresh Fruits and Vegetables

14 Spring Street, Room 105

Seattle, Washington

Dear Chun Hoon, Hong Kong
We have some really big red apples for sale. They are called Winesaps.

They come from Brewster, Washington in the U.S.A. My dad wants to sell

you some. You should buy them. They taste really good.
Sincerely,
Mike Davies

Seattle, Washington

1939

Mike would also walk around the office and open file cabinets and look at invoices and other documents. He daydreamed about a future in which he sold fruit all over the world. Mike wanted to grow his own apples and own his own ship. He would sail around the world delivering apples to the four corners of the globe.
In his father’s office Mike found a copy of the National Geographic. There was a full pictorial layout on the Kodiak Brown bear. Mike was fascinated by the piece. He showed one of the pictures to his father. Myron agreed they were majestic animals. He explained to Mike that the Alaska territory presented almost unlimited potential.
He went on to explain that Alaska was a land of great riches and natural resources. Myron told his son their firm was already shipping merchandise to Alaska. Myron looked out the window and pointed to a ship tied up at the pier. He said “ that ship will be carrying merchandise to our customers in Alaska”.
Myron slid a stack of bills of lading in front of Mike. He told his son he could look them over if he wished. He also lectured Mike to keep the bills in order and not to fold them or damage them at all. Mike read the bills with amazement.

M.L. Davies Company

Distributors Fresh Fruits and Vegetables

14 Spring Street, Room 105

Seattle, Washington
Ship to:
Bayside Grocery

Ketchikan, Alaska Territory

Stow low, below water line

5 Crates Red Delicious apples

5 Crates Winesap apples

5 Crates Navel oranges

3 Crates Green Cabbage

15 Sacks Potatoes bakers 100lb

5 Sacks Onions yellow 50 lb
Stow “ tween” deck
10 Crates Tomatoes Cuba, breakers

5 Crates Bananas, tropical code 2
Dry stores upper hold
20 Cases Green River Soda
Consign to

Alaska Steamship Company

S.S. Latouche

Pier 46 Seattle

Mike was completely fascinated by the idea of shipping merchandise in the holds of cargo ships to remote outposts in the Alaska territory. He asked his dad when he could start working for the company. He told his dad he was an excellent typist. Mike said he would come in on Saturdays and type bills of lading. Mike further explained he knew the difference between the Red Delicious, Winesap, and Gravenstein apples. Mike had memorized a chart from the wall in the office. Winesap and Gravensteins were light red in color and were tart. They were both good for eating and baking. Red Delicious were a sweet apple, mostly for eating. They were distinguished by the five star outline on the blossom end. Myron shook his head and chuckled. He said “ my now, you’ve been studying your apple charts haven’t you”?
Myron had difficulty processing Mike’s enthusiasm for the business. He reminded Mike there was much more to learn about the business. Myron chided his son for his enthusiasm. He told Mike that he’d have to study accounting and international business at the University Of Washington if he ever expected amount to anything. Myron was serious about this. He never considered how heavy that proposition might weigh on the shoulders of a nine year old boy. Myron was stern and was used to telling people exactly what was on his mind. Young Mike felt weak and vulnerable around his father. Mike engaged in lofty daydreams. Even at young age he felt he would have to deliver something big in order to impress his father. Soon Mike would enter the world of paid work. He couldn’t wait.
With much anticipation Mike Davies walked from the street in to the warehouse of M.L. Davies Company that day. Mike was twelve, about to turn thirteen. It was the summer of 1943 and the war was raging full steam ahead. The Seattle waterfront was bustling with activity. Myron Davies enterprise was very busy and was returning huge profits.
Twelve year old Mike was introduced to a man named George. George was a veteran of Seattle’s Commission Row. For several years he had managed the temperature controlled banana rooms for the firm Crenshaw and Bloxom. Crenshaw and Bloxom held a coveted license to import bananas under the Chiquita label from united Fruit Company. Myron had purchased Crenshaw and Bloxom earlier in the year. George had come to work for M.L. Davies Company in the purchase deal. He was now in charge of the banana and tomato department at M.L. Davies Company.
In the winter of 1941 Myron had acquired a mechanical three belt tomato sorting machine. M.L. Davies Company was the only firm on the “ row” that had such a machine. The new machine increased their production capabilities dramatically.

Everyone was coming to them for tomatoes. As a result tomato sales had increased ten fold.
The machine had a hopper at one end. George could fill the hopper with about five crates of tomatoes. This amounted to about one hundred and fifty pounds of product that had reached varying degrees of ripeness. The tomatoes would rumble out of the hopper and go on to three belts. The belts were divided up into wide, medium, and narrow widths. The belts were separated by rails that kept the tomatoes in their respective lanes.
One belt was for ripe ripe fruit, one was for “pinks”, and the other was for greens or “breakers” as they were referred to. The product was sorted by hand as the tomatoes came down the line. It took a good eye and fast hands to keep up with the pace of the machine. When the tomatoes came to the end of the belts they dropped into empty boxes. George stacked the ripes in stacks of five and lined them up on the warehouse floor. The salesmen were wheeling stacks and stacks of ripe, sorted tomatoes out to the street. Here the wholesalers and peddlers and jobbers were buying them as fast as the machine could produce product.
The pinks went to military bases, ship stores, and were shipped way north to Alaska. The breakers and greens would go back in the heated storage rooms. M.L. Davies Company had acquired the heated banana rooms of Crenshaw and Bloxom. It was in this environment in the summer of forty two that Mike Davies stepped in to the world of wholesale fruit and produce.
Alice had dressed Mike in his Sears and Roebuck striped coveralls. He was wearing heavy duty patrol boots, tied in double knots. Mike had a pair of heavy duty gloves in his back pocket. To top things off he was wearing a Milwaukee Road railroad cap. His sister Muriel had acquired the cap on a trip aboard the ski train to the Milwaukee Ski Bowl at Snoqualmie Pass. George saw the gloves in Mike’s pocket and told him he would need them to undo the wire bound tomato crates.
George showed Mike how to unfasten the wires on the crates. He showed Mike how to gently unload the tomatoes in to the hopper. George wheeled several stacks of tomatoes out of the warm room. He lined them up next to the hopper. Mike was standing there anxiously waiting to get started. George told Mike they were going to be working “asses to elbows” the rest of the day. Mike wasn’t sure what George meant by this statement. He found out sooner than later.
Mike unhooked the wires that held the top on the wooden tomato box. He carefully dumped the tomatoes in to the hopper. Mike dumped two more boxes and he thought the hopper was full. Mike moved the empty boxes to the end of the machine. This was where George would line up the boxes under the belts. As the sorted product came to the end of the line it would fill the empty crates. George had a scale and he would make sure each box contained twenty five pounds of tomatoes.
At first Mike thought the job might be too easy. Then George flipped the switch and the giant machine came to life. The tomatoes started leaving the hopper and running down the belt. There were ripes, and pinks, and greens, all coming toward George at once. Mike watched in amazement as George starting sorting the fruit. George had incredibly fast hands. Mike noted that George had fast hands, like Joe Lewis fast hands.
Any dreams Mike had of the job being easy were quickly erased. In the time Mike had wasted watching George sorting tomatoes the hopper had emptied out. Mike went over and dumped two crates in to the hopper. The hopper seemed to empty out as fast as Mike could fill it. Instantly Mike developed a more efficient system. He would unfasten the wire bound lids of five crates. He would put all five crates in the hopper. The he would unfastened five more crates, reading them fo per the hopper.
A delivery driver named Mel joined in the action about 9:30. He had run an order out to a ship at Smith Cove that morning. He joined in on tomato machine duty as he waited for his next dispatch. Mel was faster than George. Mel could work the sort line and the crate fill station at the same time. Mel would take the full crates from the end of the belt and put them on the scale. Ninety nine percent of them weighed in at exactly gross twenty six pounds.
Mel was a fine tuned perfectly efficient working machine. Mel could either work in silence or he could talk while he worked. If you struck up a conversation with him he would continue to turn like a well oiled wheel . This dream team of Mike on hopper, George on the sorting belt, and Mel doing everything else, was producing sorted boxes of ripe tomatoes at a world record pace. Stacks and stacks of crates were being sold on the street in front of the warehouse. The word had spread all over town. M.L. Davies Company was the place to go for tomatoes.
Mike reached for another crate of tomatoes. He started to untwist the metal hooks. He noticed on the crate a primitive looking label that had been hot branded on the side. It said “ tomatoes, produce of Cuba”. Mike opened five of these crates and then carefully dumped them in to the hopper.
He heard Mel say to George

“ the captain told old man Wannamaker the Krauts have already sunk five this year in the North Atlantic”.
Mike knew they were talking about the war. On commission row in 1942 everyone was talking about the war. Mel would soon be enlisting in the army. He returned to work at M.L. Davies Company after the war. He worked there for the rest of his life. Years later Mike and Mel would chat when they saw each other in the warehouse. They had formed a special bond that summer of forty two, sorting tomatoes together at 1111 Western Avenue.
At 10:00 George informed Mike it was break time. He offered to buy Mike a hot cocoa from a vending machine. Mike told George that he’d take a coffee black. Mike fought hard to choke down the black tar like substance that came out of the primitive machine. Mike had worked the first part of his first shift at Western Avenue. He had drank his first cup of coffee. George indicated it was time to get back to it.
George put his hand on Mike’s shoulder and said “ you’re a good worker Mike. You’ll make a good tomato man someday. “
Thus began a life long love hate relationship with the industry for Mike. He lived in the shadow of the old man for much of the remainder of his life.
Mike worked all summer on the tomato machine. He held his own for a young man just turned thirteen. George taught Mike how to sort the tomatoes for color. By the end of that summer Mike was adept enough to run the machine by himself. Mike loved working the tomato machine.
While he worked he would fantasize about owning his own tomato farm. In his day dream vision he saw his farm as the exclusive supplier of tomatoes to M.L. Davies Company. Mike had visions of several dozen greenhouses all producing tomatoes. Mike would have a truck and would deliver the tomatoes to Western Avenue. The more he thought about he realized he would need a fleet of trucks. He would own the biggest tomato farm of them all. Mike wanted to deliver something big. He knew his big tomato enterprise would impress his dad.
His hours spent working on the tomato machine were cathartic for Mike. His love for that old machine ran deep in his bones. Mike felt like he was in command of his own universe when he was working the tomato line. The machine was like a mental health oasis for Mike. Mike faced much self doubt and fear in his life. When he was running tomatoes the outcome was always a success. He could transition his mind in to another reality. When he was done with a run he always had three rows of tomato crates lined up.
There were ripes for the salesman to sell on the street. The pinks were for Alaska, ship stores and the military. Mike would put the the greens and breakers back in the warm room. He would mark them with a sign, indicating what day they had been run. He and George would leave the greens in the room for three days and then run them again. Mike’s contribution that first year was profound. George was able to focus more of his time on the banana operation. Which in its own right was a huge financial asset to M.L. Davies Company.
One day in August Mike walked over to a stencil machine that was located by the shipping desk. He carefully turned a dial to a series of letters, each time pulling down a handle. When the handle was pulled it punched out a letter on piece of heavy card stock. When he was done he pulled out a piece of the heavy brown card stock. Mike grabbed a device that looked like a flashlight. It was a refillable ink brush they used to stencil customer names on shipments leaving the warehouse.
Mike took his newly created sign and the stencil brush over to a giant white post in the warehouse. The post was cut from an old growth tree and was one of several load bearing beams that held up the warehouse. Mike held the stencil up to the post and ran the ink brush over it. George was curious about what Mike was up to. George walked over to the post and saw the message. Stenciled on that beam at 1111 Western Avenue in the summer of 1942, it said:
MIKE DAVIES JR

TOMATO MANAGER

M.L. DAVIES CO
Mike saved his money from his summer job at the produce warehouse. He used some of his savings to order a pair of Bushnell binoculars from the Sears Roebuck catalog. Alice Davies protested the purchase when she first learned of it. She lectured Mike about the virtues of hanging on to his money. She went on to tell him that the bottom might fall out of the market again. If it did the binoculars would seem like a foolish purchase. Mike was confused because it seemed the family was doing pretty well financially at this point. Alice told him that prosperity could be temporary. The crash could come again at any minute.
In order to appease and impress his parents Mike bought a certificate of deposit at Peoples National Bank in Seattle. He put one hundred dollars into a six month certificate. The interest rate was four percent. Myron took his son to the Joshua Green building in Seattle where Mike met Mr Green in person. One of the clerks helped Mike with his certificate. The clerk also prepared a ten dollar money order made out to Sears Roebuck and Company. This was the amount for the binoculars including shipping.
When Mike the clerk handed Mike a receipt for the certificate he noticed it was for one hundred and ten dollars. The clerk also handed Mike the money order. Mike told the clerk he must have made a mistake. He told the clerk the certificate was only supposed to be for one hundred dollars. The clerk looked toward Myron who then looked at his son and winked. He had paid for his son’s binoculars. Mike suspected that old Mr Green and Myron may have had a few pulls off a bottle that was in Mr Green’s office. Myron smacked his lips and was in a pretty good mood during the drive to the family’s home in the Phinney Ridge neighborhood.
Thus Alice Davies lost the battle of the binoculars. She did win the battle of prudent investment however. Myron had his money deposited with Peoples Bank during the crisis years of the early 1930’s. Joshua Green’s bank remained solvent and no depositors ever lost any money, even during the darkest years of the crisis. Mike renewed his certificate and over the course of one year made five dollars in interest.
Mike was patriotic and wanted to do something to aid the war effort. He knew he was too young to join the service and fight. So he joined the war effort in Seattle and participated in rubber and tin collection. The Japanese had a stranglehold on the rubber trade in Indonesia. The allies desperately need rubber for the war. Mike went around town and as part of the Youth Corps collected old tires. The rubber was used locally by Boeing in airplane production and by Pacific Car and Foundry in tank and rail car production.
Mike had a specific plan for the binoculars. He and the Youth Corps group went to work on a special project. There was a call put out to kids that had binoculars. Mike would hike up Magnolia bluff with his friends. On the bluff they would be joined by kids from all,over Seattle. Most of the kids had binoculars. Some of the luckiest kids had small telescopes. Some kids had neither but came along anyway. All of these kids would be up on the bluff watching for incoming Japanese planes. Mike felt this was the most patriotic thing he did during the war. He would stare in to his Bushnell’s intently looking for the enemy. Below him the city stood dark and silent. There was a blackout and headlights were restricted for almost three full years.
Mike would walk home, sometimes in the dark. Alice would worry about him incessantly. Mike would team up with buddies and they always made it home safely. As it worked out not one Japanese plane ever attacked Seattle. Mike hung on to the binoculars for many years to come. He had a picture from the 1960 Rose Bowl. He was sitting in the stadium watching the Washington Huskies play the Wisconsin Badgers on New Year’s Day. You could see that same pair of Bushnell’s hanging around his neck.

Chapter two (rough Draft)

I ejected the cassette tape of Steely Dan’s “Can’t Buy a Thrill”. I switched my radio to the AM band. The song “The Streak” by Ray Stevens came on. It was 1974, the war was over, disco was on the horizon, and Americans were taking off their pants and running through the streets.President Nixon was slowly slipping deeper in to the quicksand that was the Watergate affair. In a televised speech the previous night, he once again denied his involvement in the planning and subsequent cover up. One of his handlers had referred to the 1972 break in at the Democratic National Committee headquarters as third rate burglary. In his speech he had shown off volumes of transcripts of conversations that had been taped in the oval office. I watched the speech with my mom. She looked at me when Nixon signed off and said “I supported that guy, now I think he’s a rat”.

We talked about how long we thought Tricky Dick would last in office. Both of us concluded the doomed commander in chief didn’t have long. His time in power was about to come to an end.

I hit the channel button and was subjected to the song “Jungle Boogie” by Kool and the Gang. Americans were weary of the heaviness of the last ten years. We had been worn out by the assassinations of John Kennedy, Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King. Images of flag draped coffins had left Americans in a state of exhaustion. Daily body counts from Vietnam had taken its toll on the American psyche. This combination of sad stories had cast a pale of darkness over our land.

This dark shadow, cast from a cloud of gloom, had opened up a market for bands like Kool and the Gang. Jungle Boogie didn’t have any hidden meaning. It wasn’t full of symbolism and metaphors. You didn’t have to slow it down or listen to it backwards. It was a stupid song with a funky beat and banal lyrics that not one person could sing or remember. In 1974 American was ready for songs like Jungle Boogie.

I punched the button and switched to another station. They were playing “Rock On” by David Essex. Essex was mired between two genres, punk rock, and glam rock. Whatever Essex was or wasn’t his song was very easy to listen to. You didn’t have to take acid or smoke weed and sit ponder its deeper meaning. In April of 1974 the radio dial was full of this kind of music. In the next several button pushes I heard:

Sunshine on my Shoulders, Hooked on a Feeling (ooga-sakka-ooga-sakka), Billy Don’t Be a Hero, Rock Me Gently, Top of the World, The Night Chicago Died, when I hit the button one last time and the song Mockingbird by Carly Simon and James Taylor came on I was gasping for air.

I fumbled madly for the Houses of the Holy cassette. I found it, it was pink, I pushed it in to the cassette and it went clunk and started playing. I turned it up real loud and tried to erase the memory of those other songs from my mind.

And so was the state of culture in America in 1974 when I handed the thirty five cent toll to the less than enthusiastic toll booth attendant. It was 5:45 am and there were about five cars on the Evergreen Point Bridge. The late April day held some promise of an appearance by the sun. It looked like it would take a while to burn off the marine layer that hung over Seattle. That would be okay because I had a full day of work lined up.

I was going to work with the banana man, Bob Haigh. He looked like a guy that rode cross country with Kerouac in the back seat of Neal Cassady’s car. He dressed in casual slacks, wore brown shoes and groaned and grunted a lot. Haigh’s car and his driver’s license were memories from a long forgotten era. Haigh depended on coworkers for rides to and from work. Sometimes Haigh wouldn’t go home after work. He would go to Jules Mayes joint in Georgetown and hang out. Somehow, someway, he would come rolling in to work in the morning. He had more lives than Morris the cat. He had an iron constitution.

I started work that day sorting tomatoes on an old three belt sorting machine. Haigh explained to me that the old machine had come to the new warehouse when they moved from Western Avenue in 1954. Haigh had worked for the company for over twenty years.

He knew more about bananas than any guy I ever met. He showed me the tracks in the ceiling where the bananas used to arrive in giant clusters from Central America. The clusters were held by hooks like huge pieces of hanging beef. The bananas would come down the tracks through the back doors of the banana rooms. They would fill the rooms with rows and rows of the one hundred pound clusters of green fruit from the jungles of Central America. Sometimes when they were rolling the clusters in to the warehouse they would find snakes and bugs and spiders hanging from the bananas. Haigh said the snakes were pretty lethargic having made the trek all the way from Costa Rica in the refrigerated hold of a ship. He would call the zoo and they would send a guy down to pick up the snakes. Haigh would kill the bugs and spiders and just throw them in the trash cans.

Haigh told me before Castro had come along the tomatoes would come from Cuba. He explained to me that my grandfather’s company sold a lot of tomatoes because they had the sorting machine. We would dump the tomatoes in to a hopper and they would start to come down the line. There were lights hanging down right over the sorting line. You would have to move your hands real fast to keep up with onslaught of fruit coming down line. Haigh was the fastest tomato sorter I have seen or will ever see. He worked assholes to elbows, with a Pall Mall straight hanging out of his mouth.

He would start work at the warehouse at 6:00 am every day. Sometimes he would roll in on an hour or two of sleep. Some days he would roll in with no sleep at all. To this day whenever I think I feel sick or tired at work I think of Haigh. Haigh hanging over the tomato machine his hands flying. Every piece of fruit he sorted went in to the perfect belt on the machine. Haigh, the man who had seen a million tomatoes fly by. Haigh was the banana and tomato king of Occidental Avenue.

This was the same sorting machine my dad had started working on in 1942. That was when at the age of twelve he worked his first day in the business. On this particular morning I was working with Haigh and another longtime employee, Mel Ream.

Mel had started on the sorting machine in 1948. He started out in forty eight making one dollar an hour. He did a stint in the military and returned to the company upon his release. Mel was one of the employees that had been with the company when they moved from Western Avenue to the new warehouse at Occidental Avenue.

At the end of the line each belt would dump the tomatoes in to boxes. Mel would work the end of the line taking full boxes out of the way and replacing them with empties. He stacked the full boxes on pallets according to their color designation. Mel would nervously draw air in between his teeth while he rooted harder than any guy I’ve ever seen, other than Haigh. I would work the hopper and help Haigh sort the fruit by color. Sometimes early in the morning we would stack the ripe boxes in stacks on the warehouse floor. The salesmen would come and wheel the stacks away as fast as we could make them.

At about 7:30 a guy named Joe rode up on an electric pallet jack. He got off and walked over to where Haigh was sorting tomatoes faster than any computer chip would ever process data. Joe looked at him and said “hey Haigh, does the kid have any potential”? Haigh grunted, groaned and shook his head kind of up and down and kind of back and forth. Joe looked at me and said “you better find another gear if you’re going to work with these guys”. Joe looked at Haigh and said “I need fifty pinks for Kraft. Haigh shook his head up and down and back and forth and grunted and groaned. Joe got on the jack and drove off. As he did he nodded at Mel. Mel nodded back.

Haigh looked at me and he said “fifty pinks for Kraft”. He shut off the machine and said “kid let’s go look in room number eight and see what we have”. He went over to one of the banana rooms and opened it up. When we walked in there was musty dirt like smell. I immediately thought about the greenhouses my grandfather had owned in Medina. This banana room had the same feel and smell. Haigh took the tops off a few boxes. He showed me the fruit inside. He explained to me that he had run these tomatoes the day before. They had been sitting in the room at 56 degrees with some bananas. He took a box outside and set it on the sorting machine and showed me the tomatoes under the bright lights. He told me they would be perfect for the ride to Kodiak in a Sea Land van. We pulled the pallet out of the room and checked the count to make sure there were fifty cases. Haigh grabbed a strange looking brush like device. He took a stencil card from a table and started brushing on the boxes the words “O. Kraft and Sons, Kodiak Alaska”.

Crenshaw and Bloxom

Mikes father owned M.L. Davies Company. They were wholesalers of fruits and vegetables and operated out of Seattle’s Commission Row. This area was also referred to as “the street’ or “produce row’. The companies were lined up in a series of brick buildings along Western Avenue. M.L Davies Company was located in a two story building at 1111 Western Avenue. The building was built in the late 1890’s and had housed at different times The Alaska Junk Company and an ice company.

The second story was located at the street level at Western Avenue. Every morning four huge doors would roll up and the street became a market place for fresh fruits and vegetables. The street would come alive at 5:00 am with all of the workers moving produce and freight in and out of the warehouses. From the basement level, facing Alaskan Way, was the back loading dock. The back dock also had a rail spur that served the Seattle waterfront. At this back dock the long haul trucks would come to unload their cargo. Rail cars laden with potatoes and onions would be spotted at the siding and here the men would unload the boxcars. The potatoes and onions were stored in the basement along with dry goods and consignment merchandise bound for export markets and Alaska. The main level was a high ceiling barn style warehouse. There were coolers and heated rooms for bananas and tomatoes. The offices were built in lofts above the main warehouse floor. There were also lofts built for storage which were sub leased to various produce dealers and peddlers operating on produce row.

At lunchtime the warehouses came alive with sound of the ping pong ball bouncing back and forth. Myron would spend his lunch hours socializing and playing ping pong. Ping pong tables were a fixture in most of the wharf buildings along the waterfront as well as the warehouses of commission row along Western Avenue. In these lunchtime games the playing field was leveled. Every man had a chance to compete against other men, regardless of his wealth or social stature, for a chance to win at a game. Myron would occasionally enjoy lunchtime libations at the Washington Commission Company. One day he had drinks and shared a heated game of table tennis with a young union organizer. His opponent was a twenty five year old from Detroit, Michigan named Jimmy Hoffa. Hoffa was in town to work on his goal of organizing a nationwide union of truck drivers.

In another lunchtime ping pong match Myron made an acquaintance that would lead to a business deal that would forever shape the future of his life. It was in a warehouse located at 1013 Western Avenue that Myron first met a man named F.C Bloxom in 1938. Bloxom was a principle in the firm Crenshaw and Bloxom. They were a produce dealer that specialized in bananas and tropical fruit. They also worked deals in the potato and onions business. Crenshaw and Bloxom was a well-seasoned firm by the time Myron met the two principals in 1938.

In 1915 W.W. Crenshaw was operating a fruit stall in the Corner Market building at First Avenue and Pike Place. He specialized in tropical fruits and imported his goods from all over the world. He was one of the first dealers in Seattle to be granted a license to sell bananas under the Chiquita label. This license had been granted to him by the United Fruit Company. United would eventually grow to become one of the most notorious multinational corporations to ever operate in the western hemisphere.

United Fruit Company was formed in 1899 as the result of a merger between Minor C Keith’s banana trading concerns with Andrew Preston’s Boston Fruit Company. The company prospered and expanded in the early to mid-twentieth century. At its zenith it came to control vast territories and transportation networks in Central America, the Caribbean, the coast of Columbia, Ecuador and the West Indies. It maintained a virtual monopoly in the banana trade of certain countries, some of which came to be called banana republics, such as Costa Rica, Honduras, and Guatemala.

In 1901, the government of Guatemala hired the United Fruit Company to run the country’s postal service and in 1913 the company created the Tropical Radio and Telegraph Company. By the 1930’s the company had absorbed over twenty rival firms and had amassed capital of $215,000,000 thus becoming the largest employer in Central America. United Fruit also owned 3.5 million acres of land Central America and the Caribbean and was the single largest land holder in Guatemala. These vast holdings gave it tremendous power over the governments of these small countries. This was one of the factors that led to the coining of the phrase “banana republics”.

The United Fruit Company spent most of the century facing accusations of bribing government officials in the countries in which it operated. These bribes gave the company an advantage in exploiting workers, paying little in taxes in these countries, and helped the company to consolidate its monopolies. When the tide of communism began to rise the company used its power and influence to silence the efforts of communist radicals. Back home in the States the company had some of the most famous anti-communist Americans on its side.

The integrity of John Foster Dulles anti-communist motives have been discredited, due to his ties to the company.  Dulles represented United Fruit while he was a law partner at Sullivan and Cromwell in the 1930’s. He went on to become secretary of state under President Eisenhower; his brother Allen, who did legal work for the company and sat on its board of directors was the head of the CIA under Eisenhower. Henry Cabot Lodge, who was the ambassador to the United Nations, was a large shareholder in United Fruit. Ed Whitman, the head of public relations for United Fruit was married to Ann Whitman, Eisenhower’s personal secretary. The company was able to fight off most communist uprisings and efforts by Leninist organizers during the 1950’s and 1960’s. Eventually the company went in to decline and was bleeding financially by the end of the 1960’s.

Corporate raider Eli M Black bought 733,000 shares of United Fruit in 1968, becoming the company’s largest shareholder. In June of 1970 the company merged with Black’s own public company, AMK. AMK was the owner of John Morrell, the meat packing company. This new company was named United Brands. United Brands was poorly managed by Black and thus became crippled with debt. The company’s losses were further exacerbated by the devastation of hurricane Fifi in 1974, which inflicted massive damage on the banana plantations of Honduras. On February 3, 1975, Black committed suicide by jumping out of his office on the 44 th floor of the Pan Am Building in New York City. The commuters hustling to catch a train at Grand Central Terminal, as well the patrons of the Yale Club, were shocked on that winter day when the body of Black made an eerie thud as he landed on the concrete of Park Avenue.

Later that year the Securities and Exchange Commission exposed a scheme by United Brands to bribe Honduran president Oswaldo Lopez Arellano with $1.25 million, plus a promise of another $1.25 million upon the reduction of certain export taxes. Trading in United Brands stock was halted in the wake of what was referred to as “bananagate”. On April 22, 1975 Lopez was ousted in a military coup led by his fellow General Juan Alberto Melgar, in the 1975 Honduran coup d’état.

By 1915 W.W. Crenshaw had experienced exploding growth in his banana import business. In Seattle a housewife named Ada Davies had started adding slices of these tropical delights to the breakfast cereal she served her children in the morning. Corn flakes had been developed by John Harvey Kellogg in 1894 as a food he thought would be healthy for his patients at the Battle Creek Sanitarium in Michigan where he was superintendent. Kellogg’s Corn Flakes were a favorite of the Davies children. The added feature of sliced bananas made the breakfast experience even more enjoyable for the children. Myron, Eleanor, and Trevor enjoyed their breakfast, each oblivious to the fact that United Fruit was ravaging the ecosystems, governments, and way of life in the steamy jungles in a far away land. No one at that breakfast table suspected that Myron would soon become a banana baron and thus become one of the produce barons of Seattle’s produce row.

Dance Fantasy

Dear AA,

I recently attended my first AA dance. They had a disco ball, black lights, and lasers and stuff. The Dee jay was a cool guy named “DJ 12 Stepz”. It was my first clean and sober dance and my apprehension about it showed. I was very rigid and my legs had a rubber like nature. It felt like dancing on bungie cord legs. I finally relaxed a little and my dancing improved. I noticed a very attractive woman and I considered asking her to dance. At first I thought it would be easy to ask her to dance. Then my mind took over the situation and “we” started to think about it. Soon I was fully involved in being sucked down the drain that leads to the cesspool of thought. In my vision I saw us dancing together. I saw little star like reflections of the beams of the disco ball bouncing off her in angel like patterns. Next thing I knew we were married and had built a vast enterprise together. We were the hippest sober couple in the entire AA world. We were gurus, surrounded by our minions. The people would come to our mansion on the weekends and do all of our yardwork for us. They even shoveled dog shit off the front lawn! We had beautiful children, 2.4 to be exact. They were perfect specimens and both mastered calculus and spoke fluent Portuguese by the age of five. Then the wheels began to fall off the wagon. She divorced me and stole the business. She went off to live with a guy that resembled something from a Fabio dream. I fell on hard times. I was broke and had nowhere to go. I ended up living on a couch in a sponsee’s unfinished carport conversion. At first I slept on a two inch thick dog mattress with a piece of memory foam.

One day we were driving back from the twelve step club noon meeting and I noticed a couch outside a house with a “free” sign on it. My sponsee said we didn’t have a truck so we couldn’t take it. I pointed out we still had the chain in the back of his car that we used to tow my 1982 diesel Rabbit back to his house. I suggested we could chain up the couch and just tow it back to the house. Heck it was only about a mile. So we hooked up the chain to the couch and connected it to the trailer hitch on the back of the car. So off we went, down the street, towing the couch behind the car. The scene must have resembled the scene in Italy in 1945 when the Italians towed the body of Dictator Benito Mussolini behind a Fiat jeep. Mussolini had been executed by firing squad at the end of the war. The couch we were towing was, like the body of El Douche, subject to the laws of physics. When we went in to a turn at a speed of twenty five miles per hour the couch would travel outside the wake at a speed much greater than that of the towing car. The couch got caught up in some loose gravel and the hit a storm drain. It went airborne and came down hard and one of the legs broke off. In that moment I could imagine the Italians watching the little fascist ruler getting whipped in to a sharp curve. His body bouncing along in the countryside, taking out the pretty spring flowers. The couch landed upright and we managed to get it back to the house in almost one piece.

We sawed off all of the legs and tried our best to balance it with the goal being a comfortable night’s sleep. So I ended up in a two season carport, sleeping on a rickety third hand couch, sharing the room with my sponsee’s dog. The dog loved the couch and I never got a good night’s sleep. I couldn’t make it to work at the 7-11 on time. I lost my job and ended up sitting around in a bathrobe watching Netflix on a ten year old laptop, using a wi fi signal hijacked from the neighbor. I paid the neighbor kid five bucks a month for the password.

Needless to say I didn’t ask that girl to dance. Who needs that kind of trouble?

AA my question is this:

When can I expect my thinking to become less destructive and more inspirational? Heck I couldn’t even get half way through the song “Brick House” without creating a total doomsday scenario.

Steve with nine months

Dear Steve with nine months:

Recovery is a numbers game. In your first two years you get attention for being bad. Once you get to that two year mark there is a certain amount of pressure to get good. Though it seems a lot of your AA brothers and sisters appear to have it together, the sad truth is many of them don’t. One of the old timers at the 12 Step meeting hall may claim to be able to levitate the Big Book. We know that no one has ever achieved that feat. One old guy, named Old Harold, claimed to have moved the August 1979 Grapevine two inches one time at a midnight meeting. Bottom line here Steve is you need to lighten up a little. Relax and take it easy big guy. Your thinking will become more inspirational as time goes by. More important though Steve is to remember to have a sense of humor about your thinking. The scenario you laid out is certainly a tad negative. We suggest you take a walk outside and get some fresh air at the next dance. Especially if you here the opening notes to Free Bird. Just think what kind of rabbit hole you swirl down during a seven minute song?

It takes time Steve. Go easy on yourself.

Regards

AA

Coastal Carolina

Part one 

Two pillars, a long drive lined with oaks 

Planted before the time of Lincoln 
There is no sign or name visible 
No national landmark status 

No museum or restoration society plaque 

Just an overgrown carriage path 

Leading to a long forgotten plantation 

All of it dust and dirt 

The pines and palms hold in their souls 

The sound of the songs sung in the fields 

By the workers toiling the crops 

Of the low country of old Carolina 

Before emancipation and freedom 

Freed them from the bonds of slavery 

And it tears at the strings of my heart

And it wakes me up to some reality 

I have never faced 

Part two 

Down the road a man works the land 

His sign says peanuts, turnip greens, mustard greens

He works the soil of coastal Carolina 

He earns a living, he’s happy, he smiles and says 

” sorry boys I won’t have boiled peanuts until April” 

His friend is on the ground under a pickup truck 

He works with his tools attempting repairs 

A woman sits on the tailgate of a mini van 

Seeking refuge from the February sun

It’s 75 degrees today 

I can’t imagine what they do in July 
Part three 

A church sits empty, the parking lot over grown with weeds 

A tired sagging wooden structure, white paint faded and peeling 

Weathered and worn by long hot summers 

Pounded and flooded by the likes of 

Hugo, and Floyd, and Bonnie, and Charlie

And finally the one thousand year flood caused by Joaquin 

The church sits in silence 

No sign of its pledged faith remains 

The gospel preached and the hymns sung are now consigned 

To the memory of those who celebrated God 

Within its hallowed walls 

Franklin High School class of 1916

The seniors of Franklin High School in Seattle celebrated their graduation ceremony on June 8, 1916. Eighteen year old Myron Davies was a member of that class. Myron was a stern looking determined chap. He was active in several school activities and clubs. He was on the swim team, basketball team and also played football. He was a good student and had worked hard on the curriculum. He was also Vice President of the Franklin chapter of Fine Applied Arts his junior year. Myron was the son of a music teacher. His father David F Davies was the music director at Seattle’s Broadway High School. Myron grew up on the lower slope of Capitol Hill in what is the present day neighborhood of Eastlake. He lived there with his parents, his younger brother Trevor and his baby sister Eleanor. 

The family lived in a modest home and the children were provided the basic needs. The family was by no means considered wealthy by today’s standards. David Davies provided the best he could for a family of five based on a school teacher’s salary. They lived in Eastlake in an era before freeways and urban renewal. The family home was located near the shore of the heavy industrial area of lake Union. 

Myron was well read for a man of his age. His Senior quote was attributed to ancient Roman poet Virgil. Virgil was one of the most prolific poets of the Augustan period. Myron’s inclusion of Virgil’s quote would set the tone for the rest of his life. Right there in the 1916 Franklin High a School year book it is etched “ none but himself can be his parallel”. 

On June 8, 1916 on an early summer day, the principle of Franklin handed Myron his diploma. His parents were in attendance along with Trevor and twelve year old Eleanor. Myron and his family and friends were celebrating their graduation in Seattle, Washington. While the celebration was underway there was a incident happening on another continent thousands of miles away that would soon affect the lives of millions Americans. At the moment the principle handed Myron his diploma crown prince Wilhelm of the German Empire was handing Major Raynar a French officer’s sword as sign of respect. 

A garrison of six hundred French soldiers bravely defended fort Vaux. The French were attacked by five thousand two hundred soldiers of the German empire. The battle for the fort raged from June 1, 1916 through June 8. On the eight the victorious Germans took the position. At the time of surrender the French had suffered 163 dead, 191 wounded, and 246 captured. 

Among the French captured was Major Sylvain-Eugene Raynar. His men thwarted several assaults by the German forces. The French finally surrendered when they ran out of food and water. Ranar sent several messages pleading for help and reinforcements. These messages were sent via homing pigeon. During his last communication Raynar wrote “this is my last pigeon”. 

Raynar and his surviving men were marched off to a prison camp. They were held in prison for the remainder of the war. When the treaty of Versailles was signed in 1918 they were liberated and finally were allowed to go home. 

Myron proudly held his diploma. He had plans for his future. He would attend the University of Washington in the fall of 1916. Myron was fascinated by the idea of world trade. Ships loaded with commodities were passing through the newly opened Panama Canal every day. Myron envisioned himself at the head of a vast enterprise. He day dreamed that ships ladened with merchandise would carry these goods to the four corners of the globe. There were events happening in the world that would soon turn the tide of American history. In a few short months Myron Davies would be sailing for France as part of the Allied Expeditionary Force. 

 His worldly possessions were stored under his bunk in his foot locker. 

Myron sat in his bunk on the troop ship. He was reading a book and smoking a Herbert Tareyton cigarette. They were on their way to France. Where, in a place called no man’s land, the bloodiest battle ever waged on earth raged on. Amongst the barbed wire, trenches and tunnels, the Doughboys had joined the allies in the battle against the face of evil. 
A deranged man, Kaiser Wilhelm, perpetrated a war of chemical annihilation against the allies. Myron sat in his bunk and snuffed out a cigarette and turned the page of his book. He was terrified by the thought of the war. He daydreamed about happier times. He saw visions of coach Gil Dobie pacing the sidelines at a University of Washington football game. Images of watching his heroes fight on the gridiron of Denny Field danced in his head. 

He knew the war was a bloody being waged in the trenches. The war had started because of misunderstandings of privileged royalty. The war was being raged on the aspirations of those building new empires and those attempting to save what was left of crumbling empires. The armistice was signed one month after Myrons navy battalion arrived. His group was assigned the task of providing aid to the citizens of France. His group also helped with the delivery of supplies and aid to the millions of refugees the four years of war had created. Myron saw first hand the death and destruction the war had bestowed upon the continent. He took his duties very seriously. He knew the Allied Expeditionary Force had a job to do and he went about doing it the best way he knew. 

Once on a cloudless starlit night he glanced skyward and pondered the concept of the Creator. He wondered if there was any God at all. He wondered why God would create a world where so many people could suffer at the hands of so few. He stared into the infinite Cosmos, wondering about it all. For a moment he was like a hippie high on Acapulco Gold. The feeling was fleeting. Soon he was focused on his job again. His reason for being here was to help the people of Europe. His goal was to complete his military service and get back to Seattle. Myron Davies was going to enroll as a student at the University of Washington. 

President Harding Visits Seattle

President Harding story starts here
By 1923 Myron had established himself among the ranks at the Connell Brothers. He was intrigued with idea of shipping goods to the U.S. Territory of Alaska. Connell Brothers was already doing a fair amount of trade in Hawaii through their San Francisco office. Myron was intrigued by the idea of shipping produce from the mainland to the territories. By being positioned in Seattle he felt there was a great opportunity to ship goods to Alaska. On July 27, 1923 Seattle was center stage for national news.
President Warren G. Harding was scheduled to arrive by ship after a trip to Alaska. Harding was the first President to ever visit the remote territory. The president had traveled out west as part of his “Voyage of Understanding”. It was the embattled President’s attempt to reconnect with the people. His administration had been rocked by scandal and corruption. The most famous of the scandals was Teapot Dome. It was a scandal involving payoffs to government officials in exchange for sweetheart deals on oil leases in Wyoming.
The nearby Seattle waterfront was a beehive of activity in anticipation of Mr Harding’s arrival. His arrival at the Bell Street Pier had been delayed. Rumors spread around town that his ship had collided with a navy destroyer in the Strait of Juan de Fuca and had sunk. Myron took the short stroll from his office at the Smith Tower down to the pier. He was excited to see the President arrive. Secretly Myron wished he could get a meeting with Harding to discuss the idea of Alaskan export. Myron had studied about Alaska and he knew it was a vast land of plentiful natural resources. He knew that if a firm was properly positioned it would benefit immensely some day from the development of these resources.
Myron finally gave up on Harding as the ship carrying the President was several hours late. He went back to the office and wrapped up his duties for the day. He headed out toward the University of Washington. He hopped off the trolley and crossed the Montlake Bridge. He walked over to the newly constructed University of Washington Stadium. He had contacts with the stadium crew from his days of being a volunteer stadium attendant at the old Denny Field. He cashed in on one of his contacts and was let in a side gate to the stadium. In a few hours the President gave a speech in the stadium in front of a crowd of 30,000 people. Myron was among those in attendance that fateful day. He noticed the President seemed a little off that day. Harding stumbled on his words and seemed to rush through his speech. Harding had dedicated a monument at Volunteer Park and visited thousands of Boy Scouts at Woodland Park before arriving at the stadium. His aides noticed something wasn’t right with President.
Later that night after a six hour stay in Seattle Harding’s entourage boarded a train at King Street Station. As they sped off into the night it became clear that Mr Harding was seriously ill. They skipped a whistle stop in Portland and went straight to San Francisco. The president retired to a suite at the Palace Hotel. All of his events were cancelled.
A few nights later Myron was listening to the radio with his family. They had tuned in to hear a recording from the Victor Opera Company called “Gems from the Mikado”. Suddenly the music stopped. What happened next turned out be the first news flash Myron ever heard on the radio. A solemn and somber voice declared “President Harding is dead”. The radio station signed off immediately.
Myron had mixed thoughts about he felt about people in general. He was dedicated to hard work and providing for his family. When it came to President Harding Myron had a felt a personal connection. He had been so close to the podium where the doomed man had made his speech. Myron had really wanted to talk with the President. He had seen the cargo being slung on to the ships bound for Alaska. He felt if he had been able to talk to Harding he might have landed some deals for Connell Brothers. He even visioned shipping cargo from his own freight warehouse someday.
The announcement of Harding’s untimely death hit Myron very hard. He realized right then the peril of delay. He realized sometimes you have to move on a deal right away. He should have talked to Harding right at the stadium. That time had passed. Warren G. Harding, the President of the United States, had stood before Myron a few hours ago. Now Mr Harding was destined to be a footnote in history. He would become a forgotten President. Warren G. Harding would barely be mentioned in history books. Yet Myron knew that Mr Harding had gone to Alaska. Maybe he had gone there to hide out and avoid the scandals that had rocked his administration. Myron wondered if Harding’s imagination had been fired on his trip north. Did Harding see the unlimited land of opportunity that Myron visioned in this vast remote territory? Myron assumed that Harding probably did see opportunities in Alaska. Upon his passing Harding had been silenced forever. Myron decided right then and there that he would figure out what bounty was in store in the land of the midnight sun. He knew from then on he could never depend on any man, not even Warren G. Harding to help him.

Mayor Ed

No more Ed Murray posts, except this one. People that rape and molest innocent victims and then vilify those victims and try to turn themselves into victims are the worst form of human scum. Sociopathic pathological lying pieces of shit. Destroy their victims lives and then go on the offensive when confronted about their hideous crimes. This is the worst form of bullying that exists. I hope he jumps off the Aurora Bridge and misses the water.