Champion News

CHAMPION-July 21, 2008

 

        In Champion the Harvest has begun!  Champions are rejoicing and bringing in sheaves.  Some have put up green beans until they’re blue in the face.  There are pickled beets on the shelf and every possible permutation of preserved zucchini.  Cucumbers are plentiful and the tomatoes are coming on.  Ahh!  E. B. White said that living in the country is a full time job in itself.  He indicated that there is hardly time to go off to earn a living with all the chores to be done.  He was born in 1899 and was a Champion wit.

        “Maybe this is the song you want, from 1918.”  This note was signed, “The Hapless Homesteader.”  It included this computer information:  DeVincent Sheetmusic, that will take a person directly to a copy of the sheet music “Huckleberry Pie.”  It is in the library at Indiana University.  “I  sat down and wrote a song not too short and not too long.  Doesn’t mean a gosh darn thing to you, but I hope you like it ‘cause I want you to.  It’s a tune that’s bound to cling, a simple little thing to sing. (Chorus) H U uc-kle buc-kel  B U uc-kle, buc-kle  that spells huckleberry Pie … …..I love that huc-kle berry Pie!”  It’s a sweet song made more so by a sweet memory associated with it.  Thanks for finding it, Hap!  Uncle Al, the Lonesome Plowboy, used to sing:  “I love you a gallon and a quart, a gallon and a quart, you dirty little wart!”  That is a Champion expression of affection!  Champions, who do a good job of living in the here and now, freely express affection for one another and are never embarrassed to do so.  Who doesn’t have a friend who managed to slip out of the world without hearing how much he was appreciated?  A Champion neighbor spoke of a friend who had been like a Leprechaun.  To paraphrase her:  “He could be in your face and get on your case, but he did it in such a charming and loving way that you could never be mad at him.”  A friend who teaches you about yourself is a gift.

        Hoovie’s sister, Eva Loyce Henson Phillips, had her picture in the Herald last week together with classmates of the 1953 graduating class of Ava High School.  She is a Champion from way back and still has a charming cousin living just over the hill from the old home place.  It is notable that the photograph shows twenty-seven or so very nice looking people.  Everyone is trim, fit looking and in a good mood.  No doubt yarns were spun and nostalgia ruled the day.  They are planning their next reunion for 2013.  Optimism is a Champion quality!

        A letter has arrived from Champion’s Friend from Oklahoma, Ethel McCallie.  She is looking forward to her 91^st birthday on August 11^th.  She has excellent penmanship and writes an informative and interesting letter in an easy conversational style.  She was recalling her visit to Champion last year and said, “I really liked seeing the little store in Champion.  It brought back so many memories of the old store at Smallett, Mo, where we went to sell eggs, frying chickens, old hens and roosters and to buy our groceries.”  She sends fond regards to Champion and hopes to get to come back this fall when she is in the area for the Haden family reunion the first week-end of September.  See a photo of Ms. McCallie at Henson’s Store and read more of her letters at www.championnews.us  She can be found in the Champion Friends section.  Also in that section there is a picture of her cousin, Darrell Haden and his wife Betty, when they made a Champion visit last year.  They are some of Champion’s Tennessee Friends.

        Champion Sam Moses sent an E-mail:  “Greetings from Greenwich, the arbitrary longitudinal center of world.”  From there he has moved on to Glasgow, “to my eyes, the most gorgeous city.”  He is making music and friends where ever he goes.  It is exciting on the other side of the pond!  On this side of the pond a lovely event occurred on Saturday the 13^th.  Esther Wrinkles and her sister Irene Dooms together with all of their children and most of their grand children met together at the home of Irene’s daughter Brenda Blake up in Strafford.  There were twenty-two family members altogether plus a neighbor who was a most pleasant and entertaining fellow.  It was the first gathering of the whole bunch at Brenda’s new home and from the sounds of it there will be more to come.  Champions love getting together with family and friends.  To the great delight of locals, Ruby Proctor spent Sunday morning in Champion.  She pointed to the place where she watched Johnny Hatfield wrestle a bear when she was ten years old.  There were both Hatfields and McCoys in this neck of the woods, but they seem to have been pretty peaceable.  It was the bears that had to be careful!

        One old Champion has said to another one, “That is just about the sorriest looking bunch of tomatoes ever I saw!”  The Old Girl agrees with him but is so far unable to come up with a remedy.  She doesn’t want to put poison on them and the ‘shield’ (stink bugs) are stinging them and that makes them ripen in an ugly way and then rot.  The blossom end rot has got some and then there are the black worms that show up on the inside of them.  It’s a caution.  The Old Dear struggles so but continues to fight her fight for beautiful tomatoes.  Recently she was told by a Native Champion that back in the old days when there were so many tomato canneries in these parts, the farmers would set aside some ‘new ground’ for the tomatoes.  Some place that hasn’t grown tomatoes in the past will have fewer insects and disease.  Then some gardening books suggest growing them in the same place year after year and in using compost made of the plants.  It is a learning process.  Linda’s almanac from over at the Plant Place in Norwood says that the 26^th and 27^th will be good days for planting root crops and so will the 30^th and 31^st which will also be good for sowing seed beds and planting flowers.

        Champions are glad to hear that the General’s wife is home and feeling better.  Little Foster and his sister Kalyssa, and their cousin Madelyn have all been a little under the weather on these hot days.  Parents and grandparents much prefer the ruckus of slamming doors and rowdy play than to see the little fellows pale and feeling poorly.  Champions are anxious to hear that they are on the mend and back up to their rambunctious ways. 

        It has been reported that one million, one hundred thousand civilian citizens of Iraq have lost their lives.  Four million are displaced.  The US has lost 4,125 service personnel there.  Some who have made it home are being lost to the emotional stresses they suffered there.  The Love and Gratitude of their Nation shown in meaningful ways will be the first steps in their healing.  E.B. White also said, “Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half of the time.”  Some Champions are now starting to worry about who owns the new voting machines that will be used in the Presidential Election this fall.  Who made them?  Who sold them?  Who profits?  It is said that it matters more who counts the votes than who does the voting.  Champions are pleased with their local election board, but some are suspicious of the National process.

        The Skyline Firefighters and Auxiliary had a meeting early in the week to kick off the official Picnic Plan!  The efforts of these hard working people and the organizational skills of their leader show up in a Great Picnic every year.  This one has an auspicious date beginning as it does on 08-08-08!  Point out auspicious dates by mail at Champion Items, Rt. 2, Box 367, Norwood, MO, 65717.

        Tombstone was a movie made in 1993, staring Kurt Russell as Wyatt Earp and Val Kilmer as the enigmatic Doc Holliday.  On the occasion of intercepting a foe in a wooded glade in the middle of the night Doc stepped forward and intoned, “I’m your Huckleberry!”  E-mail what you think he meant by that to Champion News.  Sing that Huckleberry Pie song down on the porch at Henson’s Store.  In Downtown Champion they are always looking for those spirit lifting, disease fighting, depression walloping endorphins released by song and they’re always Looking on the Bright Side!