Monday, February 17, 2025

Patricia Whitten


Patricia Whiten.. This picture was taken about 2009 at a meeting of getting a Vaners Annual Reunions. I’m a couple years older than Patricia. About 51 years earlier she asked me could she ride to summer school with me, she had no transportation there. She knew I had to go to Summer pass the 11th grade and she had a class she had o pass.
On the ride to and from school we gossiped about our common friends, TV shows, and whatever else. I think it was always general with not much personal.
Then one morning between classes somebody, I forgot who and I r had a car race. Patricia was in the car. I chased whats-his-name down Polk Street at a high speed. He was so much ahead of me I lost sight of him but I was srtill at high speed. What I did not know he was waiting on me behind the Mountain View Cemetery, fairly near their back gate. When I saw the car I was chsing it seemed like we were about 10 fee from them and we were going high speed. I slammed on the brakes and the screech and squalled something terrible and car did a spin. But we missed them. No wreck!
Patricia chewed me out in a loud voice and kept on chewing me out in her loud voice. I don’t remember if she rode back with me or not. Our car pooling days were ove.
I think we wen until I took her picture here without speaking. Shef forgave me and . We became friends again., or Facebook friends anyway.
She married and had a family.
She died several years ago.

Sunday, February 16, 2025

Joe Fry & Mr Harley




 Joe Fry, One of supervisors in the Atlanta time keeping office. The guy he is presenting an award to is Mr. Harley.I Mr. Harley and his wife loved to sit on their front porch and watched people walk by and speak to them. He was also Wayne Williams Sunday School Teacher. They are probably dead now, that was about 50 years ago. Joe Fry fought in Europe in WW II. He said every day he was reminded he was black and had to do the grunt work. He said when Bob Hope came to entertain them the white soldiers were the first people in the audience, then German prisoners were the second. And last, way back in the back were the the U.S Black soldiers. That is a shame they were treated that way, even when defending our country

Saturday, February 15, 2025

Saving the Day


 

George and his History Lectures

Back in the 1970s I carpooled to Atlanta to work daily with George. George is a Marietta native and so were his folks. He heard lot of informal local history and retained it, which is more than I can say. I looked forward to our daily drives. They were educational. Here is one of his George's narratives I happened to remember this morning: Outside of Marietta back before Lockheed came to town, out in the county was rural. Big and small farms. Once, a large landholder named Bill and his wife were having a heated argument. Bill got so mad he hit his wife over the head with something hard and knocked her out. He then set their house on fire. He was trying to push her under the burning house when she woke up. She put up a struggle and she overcame him and their roles reversed and she was trying to push him under the burning house with him struggling. I don't remember who won..

Friday, February 14, 2025

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!


 

Carol & Teenage Killer Next Door


 This is fellow retired postal employee Carol. I ran into Carol at a grocery store. Carol was a relief rural route carrier. Then she wasn’t. Then she was a Target employee. Who knows what goes on particulars that go on in people’s mind that impel them to do what they do.

Carol lived next door to fine family in a nice East Cobb subdivision off Trickum Road. If I remember correctly a little kid of the nice family next door banged on their door in the middle of night. The reason the little girl was banging her big brother, a teenage was on a killing rampage. He had just stabbed to death their parents.
It so happened that another close by neighbor was also a Marietta Postal employee, a supervisor, named Keith. Keith is very athletic, involved in sports and a smooth taker. I forgot the details but I think Keith was involved getting the teenage boy captured.

Monday, February 10, 2025

Thugs & Coloring Books

 

Killers, Thugs, and Coloring Books
Copied and pasted from my chicken-fat.com blog Aug 2009
When I first got out of the Navy I went to work for the Atlanta News Agency. The Atlanta News kept most of north Georgia supplied in magazines.
I was a route man. I went into convenience stores, drug stores, or and other stores that sold magazines and took a quick inventory of the magazines that they had on hand. When I turned in my inventories an office staff would quickly go over it and determine what to send each store on their next delivery.
Sometimes they would supply us with books to unload on the stores. They usually were not magazines but books to push off on the people that sold our magazines.
Once they gave me several boxes of coloring books. I think there were almost a thousand coloring books I had to try to sell to some poor store. I quickly found no one wanted the coloring books.. The managers said in so many words, “Don’t come back with them!”
After talking to other route men I think the idea was to sell them the books knowing full well they would return them for credit in a week or two. In the meantime, in house inventory was performed… and guess what? You don’t have to pay taxes on books and magazine that are not in the building.
So where was I going to unload almost 1,000 coloring books? Nobody wanted them.
The Federal Pen at the end of the Boulevard in Atlanta was on my route. That was my next stop.
Ahah! I wrote out a bill for the number of coloring books and backed up to their loading dock and took them out of the truck. I had the guard sign for it, I gave him his copy of the bill and went on my way, smirking on the long driveway to get the heck out of there.
As far as I know the coloring books were a hit, none were returned.
A couple of years later Anna and I went to an art show at the Federal Pen. Some of the art was fantastic. They didn’t sign their names, they signed their number. The prices were reasonable, so we bought three canvases.
Who knows, I may have had a hand inspiring them.

Saturday, February 08, 2025

Who?

Posted 4 Years Ago:
I was doing my walk this morning and haven’t even gone far enough to be off my street when a red pickup truck slowed down, then stopped and the window rolled down. An old fart, about my age, said, “How you doing?”
“So so, how you doing?” “Who is this guy?” I thought.
We talked and talked. We talked about the old days in Marietta and going to the Old Hospital on Cherokee Street, and Doctor Merl Haygood, and more old Marietta stuff. And all the time wondering “Do I know this old fart?”
We talked about our time in the service, he was in the Army about the same time I was in the Navy.
I know it is a Small World, but it would be nice if I knew who I was talking to.
He said he thinks I should get another dog. It seems he knew about Willow’s departure.
I am not sure, but I think it could have been the same guy that between 5 and 10 years ago at the bottom of the hill on the street near by in the morning before daylight I saw the flickering of flames in the back of a house. That was before I carried a cell phone, so it must have been nearer ten years or more. I bangedf on the door of the house and no one came. About that time a pickup truck slowly rode by and I ran out in the street and waved him down. He had a cell phone so he 911.
The firetrucks came and what it was flames were surrounding the LP gas bottle and the fittings. The put the flame out and woke up the woman that lived there then and told her.
Ironically, a week or so later while walking I saw the woman in her yard and I told her that I was the one who called 911 (which really it wasn’t, it was the guy in the truck). I expected a pleasant “Thank you” for saving her and her daughter’s life, but just got a glare, “Why don’t you mind your own business?”
Anyway, back to the guy in the truck this morning, that might have been the person that called 911, if he had on his mask this morning, like he should have, I could have said,
“Who is that masked man?”
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Friday, February 07, 2025

Plastic Man

 


Bill Rampley's Southern Comfort

 

My high school buddy Bill Rampley made a TV show he named SOUHERN COMFORT.  It was visual articles about people in the south.  He got to show it on a network and it was well received.  He was planning to make more and he died.




Wednesday, February 05, 2025

Lilly Henry Petty

 

Lilly Henry Petty (1886-1983), c1982. Lilly Henry married James M. "Jim" Petty (1882-1956), 21 May 1903, in Murray County, Georgia. Jim was 21 and Lilly was 16. They lived on Jim Petty Road in Crandall, Murray County, Georgia.
Jim was a farmer and when we visited them a couple of times when I was a kid. He also raised collie dogs.
They had nine children. One was a doctor, Glenn Petty, in Chattanooga who lived on Lookout Mountain. Once I read an article about Glenn's daughter Gail Petty, who went to West Point and after she was to graduate she and her brother had plans ride their bikes Maine to Florida. Another son of Jim and Lilly, Carton Petty, developed a huge farm that had its own FAA registered airport to fly out its produce. Another son Cecil, is the only son I have met. He was genuine a down-to-earth nice fellow. I am also related to Cecil's wife Mildred Baxter, through the Bookout family.
Mildred and I are both descended from Jesse Bookout, who was an overseer of Chief Vann's plantation slaves. By the way, then, it was against Georgia's law for a white man to work for an Native American. the Georgia Militia surrounded the plantation to put an end to Jesse's employment.
Jim and Lilly are buried at Sumac Presbyterian Cemetery - Murray Co., GA.
I had the pleasure of taking these pictures of Lilly in August 1978, when she was about age 92, about five years before she died. She was sharp as a tack and witty, with a wry sense of humor. One interesting story she told me was that her husband and other of his siblings had to hold down their brother Erwin Petty, while their uncle Dr. William Virgil Garrett, removed Erwin's frostbit toes without anesthesia. She was living with her son Carlton* at the time, in a big stone house on the Cleveland Highway.
*I did not get to meet Carlton on that visit, he was out in the fields working... as they say, make hay in the sunshine.

Tuesday, February 04, 2025

a big one is looming


 

Dorra Hunter Spiva

 

Here is a picture of the last Hunter Reunion I attended in June 2008. Left to right: I don't know, Franklin Hunter, Dora Hunter Spiva, and me. The following Febuarary Dora died at age 104. On that day she was witty, spry, and had a sharp mind.

Monday, February 03, 2025

Who is that man in Red?

 


Tyson Cousins

 

vI went to the funeral of my first cousin, once removed, Billy Tyson yesterday. Many people knew Billy and his garage and body shop on Hwy 92 at the Wade Green Road intersection. Billy's father, Will Tyson is a brother to my grandmother Minnie Tyson Hunter.

Also, when I mention I am a Tyson relative (my middle name) a lot of people ask me if I am related to Donald Tyson. Yes, also first cousin, once removed. His father Ed, is my grandmother Minnie's other brother. Donald is still into car racing and restoring cars. He was a house builder and then became a real estate salesman... but he told me he gave that up because he lost his hearing. I guess you need to talk and listen a lot to sale real estate.
He is in some kind of hall of fame for restoring a certain type car.
Here is a picture of Donald Tyson and his two sons.

Sunday, February 02, 2025

Ernie Marrs & THE GREAT SPECKLED BIRD


 Let me tell you about THE GREAT SPECKLED BIRD and Ernie Marrs: If you are young or new to the area, you might not heard of either.

THE GREAT SPECKLED BIRD was an Atlanta underground newspaper in the late 1960s and 1970s. It bravely took on the establishment in stories, political cartoons, and editorials. Hippy-looking people on street corners peddled the newspaper. It was well done and very informative.
One of the editors was the late Ernie Marrs. Ernie was a song writer, singer, poet, philosopher, and roofer, which was his day job, that he did not quit. Ernie wrote several songs that made it high on the charts. The one that comes to mind is "DASHBOARD JESUS."
A co-worker, Pat, knew Ernie well. They were regulars at the Stein Club on Peachtree, just south of 10th Street. One time, I think it was a Sunday Anna and I were driving around with Pat and she was telling us all about Ernie Marrs. She asked if we wanted to meet him and we said yes.
He lived in Little Five Points in a garage apartment. When we got to the steps leading to his apartment I had been drinking some, and had to pee. I thought I would use Ernie's bathroom. I couldn't hold it much longer. I was the first one up the stairs knocking on the door.
No one came.
Ernie was not at home.
Like I said, I could not hold it any longer, so I urinated off the top landing of his steps, facing the big looming buildings of Atlanta. Anna and Pat were waiting in the car.
Then I heard footsteps running up the stairs. I introduced myself to Ernie Marrs, changed hands and shook his hand.
We had an instant party. He played some good music and poured the booze. He was glad to see us, or I suspect he was glad to see Pat. He pulled out correspondence he had with Bob Dylan and other nobles of the topical folk world and read and pointed out things in the letters.
I think we had a party and invited him once and if I remember correctly, he had to work late, those roofs don't put themselves up, you know

Saturday, February 01, 2025

Chicken-fat Blog explained

 

This is about my blog chicken-fat.com. Yes, you will see some cheap self-promoting along with some shameless bragging, if you read it.
I started the blog in 2006. I had no idea what I was going to say or why say anything? Finally I decided to put whatever pops into my head, within reason. I am doing this for a mind exercise. I feel myself getting more forgetful and senile, so sure a little brain calisthenics should help.
Then I got interested in genealogy and it became an excellent vehicle to share all the family information.
Of course, the blog kind of has a MAD Comic fever. That is because I have been a MAD creators fan many years and hat MAD outlook has rubbed off on me, I have a warped outlook like MAD.
I don’t like to argue politics. I have friends that think complete opposite than I do, and no maater wha either of say, we will not change each other’s mind. Arguing politics is a waste of time.
It did not take long, maybe a year or two to decide emails comments to the blog was a pain in the ass. People wanting more details, people suggesting private jokes that leave the average reader senseless, correcting me, and so on. So finally, I found a switch on my homepage thing to block comments. So
CLICK!
For many years my readership daily has been between 50 and 130, give or take.
But about a couple of months ago my daily readership fell to less than 50. Then I jokingly said all the readers for the previous day could fit into my truck if one or two would agree to sit in the bed.
Now, a new mystery has developed. My daily readership have jumped into the thousands.
I went to the intestines or brain of the blog and discovered something I did not know I had. It is a report of visitors up to the minute.
Here is the latest report: Followers 21; 9650 Posts; 9570 Comments; total number visitors since it started 1,825,513. Today 1508 visitors. Yesterday 2668; This month 7672; and last month 5186
I lit up when it said readers comments 9570.
Even though the comments were blocked they were still there. But not all were there, over half were censored because of their contents. But still I have over 400 comments to read, which hopefully will be a treat.
But back to my brain. Why such a sudden big visitor increase? I don’t like big crowds, they are intimidating.