ANYBODY OLD ENOUGH TO RECALL ROAD TRIPS WHERE YOU SLEPT IN YOUR CAR?
My mother got this 1952 Plymouth and I recall several road trips to visit relations in Houston and Jasper, Arkansas, where we pulled over at dark and slept in the car until the next morning.
This was the early 50's and while there hotels in the cities for travelers, auto courts were just coming into play in mid-America and it was still a good few years before motels came on the scene.
It wasn't unusual on the outskirts of small or mid-sized cities to find a scattering of cars pulled over to the side of the major roads, travelers just saving $ by sleeping in their cars and going on with their trips the next day.
(Photo summer of 1952, Chicago, me at 6 and the 52 Plymouth.)
From my Facebook page:
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7/15/20 from facebook
DO YOU HAVE A WILL? INFO FROM THE ARCHIVES FYI:
I need to go back in time quite a bit, to the late 1970's to set the stage for how this ended in 2001.
My grandfather was into stocks all his life, bought them mostly and seldom sold any. He encouraged me to put my little savings into some stocks - this when I was in grade school and then in High School.
So eventually he passed on, leaving his portfolio to his wife, my grandmother. It remained pretty much unchanged, little if any was spent. Then she also passed on and I returned to the family home in Cook County, Illinois for her funeral.
During my few days of visiting before going back to my home I asked my mother if 'grandma' had left a will. I am going to take a guess that this was about 1978, I was about 32 years old. My mother simply said 'No, she didn't have a will, she wanted me to have everything'.
Well I was just asking a casual question and the reply was all I needed and I didn't think of it again for over 20 years. Then my mother passed on in 2001 and in her will she nominated me as her executor for the estate and I went up to Cook County (think Chicago suburb here) home to start the ball rolling.
Now most of this is done by a section of the bank which assigns a rep to move it along and also the bank lawyer is working on it to a certain extent, but still decesions have to be made by the executor (me), the house has to be sold but even before that, the executor has to see to the disposal of all manner of stuff.
Drawers long shut must be opened, expired records tossed out, clothing given to the church for their rummage sale, a lot of stuff cramed into my 5 day visit.
Now my mother (and father also) was in the Marines and she had a lot of correspondence from that plus she was to a certain extent a writer of stories she tried to market. I had file cabinets of stuff to glance at, make a decision: keep or toss out. Almost all was tossed out. Papers from the 1950's ended up in the trash.
All, that is, but one five page item that should have been long ago trashed. It was my grandmothers will and in it she left the stocks and some money to be divided equally between my mother and myself. I expect that the total was about $300,000, half to me half to my mother. The will was never disclosed or filed for probate as it should have been.
So I guess the moral of the story, if there is one, is that you can't even trust your mother when money is involved.
As the years had passed I also went back to college to get a 2nd degree, this in paralegal studies and the favorite course for me was titled: "Wills, Trusts and Probate" This was 1985-6, pretty much between my mother saying there was no will and her demise.
So when the lawyer for the bank forwarded me a copy of my mothers executed will during those 5 days I spent at my old home, I got as far as page 3 and stopped everything to call both the bank rep and the bank attorney.
My mother had given various bequests to this or that person, then for the main body of her will she gave away percentages of the remaining funds (ie: stocks and cash in various accounts). I got 50% another person got 15 percent, the VFW got 5% and after listing all this the sentence that got me on the phone to the bank officials read- ". . . and my son can choose any property he wants".
Possibly she intended I could have the toaster, or a favorite lamp or some photos. Very sloppy drafting of this will, the lawyer should never have let something so ambiguous be in the will. Happily for me he made a mistake.
Now 'property' has a significant legal definition, property is 'anything of value'. It can be a toaster, a lamp, or stocks, money in accounts etc. Property is 'anything of value'.
So in my 2 phone calls I read the relevant sentence to them and told them that 'I choose everything'. So that odd little sentence that probably meant something different to my mother, got me from having 50% of the estate to having 100% of it (less some specific bequests).
The stocks my grandfather bought, passed down to my grandmother largely intact, then from her to my mother (who should have had only half of it) and finally 30 or so years after my grandmother died I regained the bulk of my grandfathers stock portfolio, still about $300,000.
So what is learned from all this?
1) Never trust your mother,
2) Take law classes, particularly those involving wills,
3) If you are a beneficiary to a will be sure and read the damn thing,
4) All of the above!
I believe I mentioned that I always do my own will, and have it vetted by my attorney.
My own estate isn't much and it isn't complicated so I can do my own, and in fact this summer I will re-draft it and get it witnessed.
(photo: my grandmother Mabel Hunter, 1970, Ft Lauderdale, Fla)
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3/24/18
New addition, cost w/box of ammo just under $700.
#1 (Top) Sat. March 24, 2018
COLT Combat Cmdr, .45 Satin
#70SC39796
#2
KEL - TEC 9 mm Blue
132496
#3
SDIG SAUER .380 Equinox, Blue/silver
27B373967
#4
NORTH AMERICAN ARMS .22 Nickel
L024265
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Lunch at local IHOP March 18, 2018
3/3/18
Misc. I have been considering how to get photo albums and other family info passed on to my 2 children. I use the internet for research quite a bit and this time around I looked at NM court sites and input their names.
Unfortunately I got back a good deal of information regarding the 2 children, none good info so I decided to not bother with having the family documents/photos forwarded upon my death. They have never been in my will so nothing has to be changed there.
In the unlikely event that anyone cares I have set up 2 blog sites with the arrest history: https://charleseharris.blogspot.com/ and
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12/6/17
1940 CENSUS INFO NOW
PUBLIC
Do you have any interest in
knowing about your family or friends from 1940?
I did. I had
the address of where my grandparents, great grandmother and mother lived in
Chicago (17th Ward). So I looked up the address and found very interesting
info.
In 1946 I became a member
of this household and lived there for about 5 more years. So I remember the
house, neighborhood and of course my family.
What I found in looking up the
address was a very neat and legible page with many questions. This was in the
days when people freely gave out information about their households.
I copied the page, copied a
blank census form of that era and completed it online, taking the handwritten
information and inputting it in a printed typeface.
You can do that also, just
takes some time and effort, but even if you never bother to make up a more
legible form like I did, you still can fairly easily access your family records,
and keep in mind that the info is available for pretty much everyone on that
block or blocks.
So you can do a bit of snooping
to find out where the neighbors worked, what they made, who they were etc.
The cute kid in the photo is
'me' from Easter 1949, standing on the sidewalk in front of the house researched in the
records below.
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11/23/17
TURKEY DAY LUNCH
at Pickadilly on Cobb Pky in Marietta. Very busy today, 15 min. in line to get my lunch.
Probably will dine there Xmas and New Years Day also.
Recent Photo:
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GONE TO GLORY
(London, 1991 - Georgia, 2017)
Unlike most of my New Years resolutions, the one I made in this centenary year of 1900, I faithfully kept. The fulfillment of my housekeeping duties eventually brought me to a stack of tattered newspapers that I had kept, sitting on an old trunk in the darkest part of my attic.
Although up to that point I had been suitably ruthless in discarding various odds and ends I found myself brought to a standstill by my almost forgotten copies of the Bismark Weekly Tribune, variously dated in June and July of 1876.
With muttered apologies to sleeping dogs everywhere, I eventually undid the latch and opened the musty trunk. Glinting dully in the light cast by my lantern, just as I had left it 20 years and more ago was a tarnished brass bugle with a frayed yellow cord. The raised insignia on the top was that of crossed sabers and the “U” and “S” to either side and the numeral 7 above.
With a clarity I had hoped never again to experience I recalled an expedition to the Powder River area of what later became the 41st State of Montana. During that more adventurous period of my life I was bitten by the gold bug and my late brother Seth and I joined an expedition in May of 1875 and we set off with high hopes and a limited budget to seek our fortunes.
Montana Territory was remote but beautiful. It was by recent treaty the home of the Sioux Nation who had been promised by President Ulysses S. Grant that they could live there undisturbed so long as the sun rose and the rivers flowed.
Unlike the White man the Indians believed that a promise given by a chief was to be respected. Perhaps they would have been left to themselves but a trapper who had also done some prospecting around Sutters’ Mill in the 50's found some “color” as we called gold dust in those days.
Seth and I were in Rapid City that summer and full of piss n’ vinegar, so when the opportunity to join Ed Bismark’s group presented itself we quickly agreed. We wouldn’t have recognized a gold bar if it had dropped on our toes but we had some time on our hands and the Indians were said to be down Laramie way keeping the Buffalo Soldiers on the hop.
We stopped by the dry goods store and got some extra rounds for our.44's and started west on our 130 mile journey.
So many things went wrong with that trip that after only 7 weeks we were down to just five in the party, the others having had enough of the rattlesnakes and the baking heat of the hottest summer known in those parts since the White man had come, most had decamped for the saloons of Silver City and Deadwood. We resolved to try just one more spot, a tributary of the Yellowstone, west of the Rosebud. It wasn’t much of a river, only knee high at the deepest, tho to judge by the river banks it would in most years, be considerably higher.
The 24th of June that year was only memorable for being extremely hot and also Seth’s 30th birthday. We had as much of a celebration as 5 people could reasonably expect to have with 2 bottles of whiskey and the nearest town 100 miles away. None the less the next day I was the only one frisky enough to want to do any prospecting.
So as not to annoy my companions with a show of my enthusiastic gold panning I left the camp quietly.
After several grueling hours of working steadily up river I was a good three miles from camp, not a particularly smart more in Indian country and I had resolved to start back when I thought I heard faint shouted commands and the jingle of harness which was caused, I felt certain, by the passage of a considerable body of men further up the river.
Having been without sight of any but our own party for almost two months I was anxious to get news of what was happening in the world. I hastily emptied my pan and snatched up my Sharps Buffalo Gun and legged it for the bend in the river, beyond which I was hoping to find some new faces and perhaps even news of any new gold strikes.
No more than a stones throw from the bend I came to the place where several hundred shod horses had forded the river. I pressed on in their wake and shortly came upon a small but hastily deserted Indian encampment. Several Teepee’s, a still smouldering fire and a divergence in the tracks, the larger group going North and a somewhat smaller group heading South.
Plainly I could not keep up with mounted men so with a second glance at the recently abandoned Indian camp I prepared to start back the four miles or so to our own camp site.
A scattering of shots got my instant attention. I dropped to the ground before I realized that no one was firing at me. In the distance a bugle called, more shots, a cheer and a second call which I clearly recognized as the charge. Intense and sustained firing now to the north. It was four miles to the dubious safety of my four companions or just over the hill to what must surely be several hundred U.S. Cavalry.
Not much of a choice in the suddenly hostile countryside. I was up and running Northward in a flash. Breasting the rise I looked down at the banks of the river and saw a sight that would forever be etched in my memory. Engulfed in a swirling sea of mounted Indians was a rapidly diminishing knot of blue uniforms struggling up the slopes of a gentle hill towards the high ground at the top. Seeing no chance of help from that quarter I quickly turned to retrace my route, but in my haste I stumbled on a half buried rock and I felt my feet going out from under me.
It could have been hours or minutes later when I felt a hand shaking my shoulder and Seth was asking if I was all right. I croaked out a reply about my throbbing headache, grunted and haltingly got to my knees. I pointed feebly towards the river and after a quick glance Seth said that it was a real nice view but that if I was finished with my nap we should start back for the camp or not expect anything to be left from dinner.
Seth helped me up, handed me my Sharps, then picked up my hat and from under it produced a dented brass bugle which he admired briefly before commenting that I was suppose to be looking for gold, not lost army property. With a final look North to the placid and empty hillside by the river I followed Seth. By the time we got back to camp I had decided not to say anything about what I thought I had seen. I got some good natured ribbing about the dangers of sleeping on the Job with Indians about.
As we had no luck in finding any “color”, the 25th of June was our last day and we packed it in. Seth went back to our folk’s place in Council Bluffs and I sent the bugle back with him. I remained in Wheeler that winter and put my Sharps to good use doing some hunting for the army at Ft. Peck. They hadn’t gotten any contracts let for the supply of beef, so except for the supplies coming up the Yellowstone by steam boat, the only fresh meat for the fort was what buffalo and elk I brought in.
The talk that Winter was all about the Indian troubles. The Sioux and Cheyenne had been raising Hell as close as 10 miles from Laramie and enough was enough. Gen. P. N. Sheridan was told to round them up and to make sure they stayed on their reservation.
My having recently been out in the Yellowstone and Black Hills areas it was natural for the army to offer me a job as civilian scout for a 90 day term. I signed on in mid-March.
Units of the 5th and 7th cavalry assembled at various frontier outposts and after considerable delay we rode out of Camp Cook on the Little Missouri in mid-May to the 7th Cavalry tune of “Gary Owen”.
For over a month 1,200 men and horses, in 3 columns followed one trail after another without finding more than small encampments of women and children. Finally our Cree Indian scouts came across the tracks of several very large groups moving North from Wyoming into the Rosebud area.
By now my contract had expired and I was simply riding along for a few more days until I could find a likely place to try my luck just one more time in panning for gold.
And so it was that on the 24th of June 1876 I was again in the Big Horn/Powder River area. This time with 9 troops of the 7th Cavalry. At my recommendation we stopped that night at the same camp where Seth and I had been prospecting the year before.
The final evening I spent with the troops I was invited to eat with the Colonel and I was able to give him a good commentary on the surrounding countryside based on my wanderings the previous year.
However, I decided not to make mention of my hallucination or dream of the year past. The Colonel was an educated man and a graduate of West Point, not a man likely to appreciate such campfire stories from a departing civilian scout.
The next morning the bugler sounded “Boots and Saddles” and I watched my former comrades ride out. Gathering my meager belongings I started out after them at a more leisurely pace, better suited to my new civilian status.
A few miles later I forded the river after them and almost immediately came to a small but deserted Indian encampment. The command had divided here as I knew they had planned. Capt. Benteen taking 4 troops South to join Maj. Reno, while the Colonel continued North with 5 troops.
I continued on westwards at a good pace anxious to reach the foothills of the Bighorn Mountains. I cut many sign of large and small groups of Indians moving Northeast. Whole villages were on the move and had passed by only a few days previously. My luck held and I saw not a living soul, White or Red.
June faded into July, August came and went, in early September the first bite of Winter was in the air and I decided to head on over to Deadwood in the hopes of getting on with Bill Hickok as a deputy or even riding shotgun for the Overland State.
It was by then obvious to me that my fortune was not to be made as a prospector.
A weeks ride brought me to the fringe of civilization in the form of a fence line and I followed that to a line shack which looked promising for a hot meal and some civilized company. Anyone out of work or riding the fence line as they say, was always welcome to drop by for a free meal at any ranch or line shack. So I was welcomed by a grizzled old cowboy and we swapped lies and inquired of mutual friends.
A pile of dated issues of the Bismark Weekly Tribune newspaper was stacked next to the pot bellied stove and pointing to them I asked what was going on in the world? He replied that he was a bit shy of ‘book learnin’ but I was welcome to help myself as he was just using scraps of them to light fires in the stove.
I picked up the top paper which had been torn across and wadded up, I was going to pass on to the next paper but the heavy black border of a death notice caught my eye and I read with interest: “. . . was the youngest Brevet Major General of the Union’s Michigan Cavalry Brigade at Gettysburg, accompanied Gen. Sheridan on his last great cavalry raid. He led the last charge at Appomattox Court House which stopped Lee’s army and personally accepted Gen. Lee’s flag of truce.
Accepting a lesser rank of Lt. Colonel in the regular army at the end of the war, he served in the frontier Indian Wars, winning numerous victories and defeating Chief Black Kettle. In his final battle, June 25, 1876, he was beaten by Chief Crazy Horse and died alongside his brother Tom, a Captain in his command and 262 others in a fierce and bloody battle in the Black Hills, Montana Territory. He is survived by his wife Elizabeth.”
The papers I saved from the stove that day in September 1876 I had put with the dented bugle in my parents attic where they remained all these many years. I’ve often wondered if I should have mentioned my hallucination or vision to the Colonel that final evening, but perhaps he wouldn’t have thanked me for telling him what I thought I saw over the hill that day on the bank of the Little Bighorn river.
With a start I realized that the afternoon had gone and I quickly replaced my mementos in the old trunk, just before the lid slammed down my eyes were drawn for the final time to the last line of the obituary, “Gone To Glory: George Armstrong Custer, R.I.P.”
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Author: ‘C W Harris, this 6 page short story was started in London in 1991 and put away until April 2017 when I found a copy, did some minor edits and finished it off. I guess you could say that I am a pretty slow writer, but like the story of the turtle and hare, I finally got it finished. Contact: harris2016@aol.com
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3/15/17
No the car wasn't reopened it is at the Ford dealer for a fix on the electronic throttle which has a service bulletin out. No charge to me, just an annoyance for a day.
1/17/17
Recent Medical Info:
================
7/14/16
At this late stage in life all this stuff seems to be run together and it is hard to sort out what year this or that took place.
If it were not for some major events taking place I might not even recall:
JFK Shot - 11/22/63, Bookkeeping class at CSHS
Married - 6/66, attending Univ of NM Summer Session
Disney World Opens - 10/1/71 Living in Ft Lauderdale
Lockerbie Bombing - 12/21/88 Living in UK
OJ Verdict Announced - 10/3/95 Visiting UK
Mother Dies - 2001, 2 yrs into living in Ga (been here since)
Heart Valve Replaced - Oct/Nov 2007 Delhi, India
Purchased Fla Condo - 5/2007
Sold Fla Condo - 1/2013
Moved to Canton - 9/30/15
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5/30/16
Now and then I post and add photos to this blog, it is just for my own use and to document my life to a very limited extent.
Since I don't lead an exciting life it is likely to be very boring to anyone who happens to wander in here for a look.
Contact Info: harris2016@aol.com
http://harrisphotostorage.blogspot.com/,
http://harriscobbcountygeorgia.blogspot.com/
Aug 1994, Below, Buffalo NY Downtown, just before moving to Lighthouse Point, Florida.
June 15, 1999 Below - While on a 2 week vacation to Cape Town South Africa I got a SA driver license, it was awallet sized item, like our own documents, the shown item was just the larger form they provided you.
6/13/99 Signal Hill, Cape Town, South Africa during 2 week vacation
Photo Below: Steve Henry
==========================================
Sept 1994 - On vacation. Visiting Mary Francis Bridge in her condo at 3584 E Villa Knolls Dr, Las Vegas, NV 89120. She has since moved to Sparks, NV and married.
9/94 MFB at some amusetment section of strip hotel
9/94 - 3 photos taken at Hoover Dam
Valetta, Malta
Above: Valetta Waterfront
Below: Sept 1995 Valetta, Malta, On Vacation
Below: 11/16/96 London (Hammersmith bus station), UK
11/96 UK Visit - on train
7/94 Below: On a trip to Fla from Buffalo NY, Taken at Holiday Inn, Ft Lauderdale
During 7/94 I took photos of places in Fla that I had lived or stayed.
1st below is of my fathers house at 3281 Boutwell Rd, Lake Worth Fla. He lived there until his death in the 1970's with his second wife Skeeter and step daughter. I first visited for 2 weeks in the summer of 1960 - later I visited many times as I lived in Florida also.
2nd is where I and wife Thelma lived at during my Junior year at Florida Atlantic Univ (Boca Raton) 310 S 3rd Ave in Lake Worth. Photo taken 9/94.
3rd below is 620 Allen Ave, Delray Bch where wife Thelma and I moved to after the 3rd St rental in Lake Worth. This was for a year+ during Senior Yr at FAU 1967-8, taken 9/94.
Above: Taken on 9/94 On a trip to Las Vegas I took this photo of the plaza where Ronald Lee Graham had his 'Special Weapons' gun store, probably about 4900 Maryland Pky South. His store was there about 1980-81. In 2nd unit from left in the building in the back of the plaza. This was during the time I lived there 1974 to 82 at several addresses incl 5252 S. Maryland Pky, just down the street from the store. Graham eventually moved to Tucson then Portland, Or.
Lighthouse Point rental Condo
Below: Aug. 1994 Dining Room of rented condo in 5202 N Federal Hwy, Lighthouse Point, Florida - lived there 5 yrs and 2 months.
4/14/96 Below 1985 Chevy Astro Van, had it for years, originally bought in Oregon
4/14/96 Below: Pompano Fashion Square, 2nd level
Below: Jan 1996 at condo, 4502 N Federal Hwy, Lighthouse Point, Fl
March 31, 1999, Kitchen of above rental condo
Below: Sept. 1999, 4 photos of me at 3938 75th Street West, Bradenton, Fl 34209.
I lived here for about 8-9 months after moving from Lighthouse Point. After this I moved to 2850 Delk Rd. Marietta, Ga for 1 1/2 or 2 yrs, then on to my own house 3236 Summer Stream Ln, Kennesaw, Ga for 15 yrs.
2000/2002 2850 Delk Rd, Marietta, Ga. Rental Complex, lived here 1 1/2 or 2 yrs. Last there Feb 2002 when I moved to my new home in Kennesaw.
8/4/2004 - Backyard of home purchased in 2001. Still have the hat and the lawn furniture. The umbrella did get replaced.
Now and then I post and add photos to this blog, it is just for my own use and to document my life to a very limited extent.
Since I don't lead an exciting life it is likely to be very boring to anyone who happens to wander in here for a look.
Contact Info: harris2016@aol.com
http://harrisphotostorage.blogspot.com/,
http://harriscobbcountygeorgia.blogspot.com/
Sunday, January 01, 2017
Always good to have something handy in case you need it.
Voted for Trump, put bumper sticker on my car.
Below is ballot mailed in. In those cases where there was just an 'incumbent' and no one running against the person, I wrote in my own name. Didn't win anything this year.
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Sept 15, 2016, Canton house at night:
8/12/16
Picking Up Mail at Holly Springs Post Office
9 months old - 2016 Ford Explorer XLT ($45,272) Have 5300 miles on it. Average about 18 miles a day. Would have been cheaper to just call a taxi than buy a car.
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5/18/16
Canton, Ga house, backyard.
12/26/15
Some new things for the end of 2015. A new 11 yr old house in Canton, Ga. for 150,000 and a new 2016 Ford Explorer for 45,280, a Rolex GMT watch for a few bucks under $10,000.
11/30/15
Purchased this 2016 Ford Explorer Limited edition last Friday for $45,272 cash, and turned in the leased 2013 Escape that I had for 2 yrs 9 months.
The 'old' Kennesaw house on Summer Stream Lane is gone and it has been replaced by a 3 bedroom 2 bath house in Canton, Ga. The lot is smaller as it the house, but it is all that I need for just myself.
Purchased it for about $150,000 cash and moved in Sept 30, 2015. The place is 11 years old. I have taken out a homestead and age exemption of the property, this should take effect and greatly reduce the $1,200 tax for the property, but not until next tax time, already paid the higher cost for this tax season.
I am 20 miles and a half hour drive from the old place. I am discontinuing the Kennesaw PO Box but keeping the one in Marietta for now. My local box is P O Box 3 in Holly Springs, 1 3/4 miles from here.
Shown below is myself, in the small bedroom used as an office. That is one of 4 of my mothers paintings that I have in the house. I ended up coming out ahead on the sale of the K. house and put some $9,850 into a Rolex watch, and the car shown above. The house purchase came out of other funds not attributed to the home sale.
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3/22/15
I was both member, V. Chairman then Chairman of the Las Vegas branch of ASIS. The lapel pin was probably from the American Federation of Police (AFP) but it was also known as American Law Enforcement Officers Assn (ALEOA) but it is to small to make out for sure.
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